Spring Conditions
by strange-charmed
Summary: AU Ten/Rose. John Smith is desperate to impress Jeanne Poisson - the girl of his dreams - by learning to ski, but his ski lessons at an out-of-the-way ski lodge change things in ways he never could have expected.
1. Chapter 1

He's completely smitten with her at first sight, head over heels, arse over elbow, name it and he feels it - she's a song and a dance, and he's a stuttering fool when he thinks about her. It's the way her blond hair dances as she laughs and smiles, and the coy little expression on her face that has John Smith completely infatuated. She's rich, beautiful and completely out of his league, and spends months flirting with him (well, with _everyone_ really, but he tries not to think about that). He's not sure she's even interested in him; until, that is, she invites him along to stay at her favorite resort in Chamonix-Mont-Blanc with a dozen of her closest friends on a ski trip in a few months' time.

He's so elated over the idea that _Jeanne Poisson_ invited him along that it doesn't immediately register that he doesn't know _how_ to ski.

The thought panics him slightly, even more so than his seeming inability to remember to pay his rent on time. As a university-level physics lecturer, he doesn't have a large salary, and knows he'll need to scrimp to afford the trip: resorts in the Alps are notoriously expensive, after all, and Chamonix more so than most. Still, he knows he'll manage - he always does, even if his bank account might not have much to show for it after the trip.

His lack of experience skiing however, is a different matter entirely, and one not so easily fixed. It bothers him- he's so used to being an expert in everything he does, that the thought of being a novice at something, not even sure where to begin, is rather uncomfortable for him. He knows he can't _tell _her that he's never been skiing in his life - but also he knows he's brilliant, and he's sure he'll think of something. So, when he finds an ad for ski lessons in Swinhope Moor in the hills of Weardale, he signs up immediately. It sounds ridiculous at first, cross-country skiing through farmland in an abandoned mining town flanked by low-lying hills in the-middle-of-nowhere-UK hardly seems comparable at all to skiing in the awestrikingly dramatic beauty of the much-romanticized French Alps, but he signs up anyway. He feels like a fool, but he is a fool in love and he doesn't want to make an even bigger fool of himself in Chamonix not even know how to lace his skis.

Or, for that matter, if skis even _have _laces.

After his lectures are over on one chilly Friday afternoon in November, he packs a weekend duffel bag and loads it into his old blue Volkswagon. Or, rather, what has the _body of _a Volkswagon - he's interchanged so many parts to customize it to his exacting specifications over the years that on the inside, it's really part Toyota, part Citroën, part Vauxhall, and maybe a teeny-tiny-bit Mercedes S-class that was only pilfered in the most _literal _sense of the word. He feels almost furtive, like he's sneaking away to do something secretive, and, in a way, he is. He's told hardly anyone of his weekend plans - his good friend Jack Harkness is the only one who knows about his skiing lessons, and since this adventure is in pursuit of _l'amour passionné_, Jack heartily approves. More importantly, he knows Jack will keep quiet about this - the worst thing he can think of would be his embarrassment if word of his lessons in the back-of-beyond ever got back to Jeanne.

Smile on his face, he gets in his car, buckles the seatbelt, starts the engine (welll, that last part does take him two tries, and is finally achieved by use of a mallet he keeps under the driver's seat just for these kinds of emergencies). Ready for adventure, he cheerily starts driving north on the several-hour journey from London to Weardale.

How bad can it be?

o~o~o~o~o~

Five and a half _fucking_ hours later, he arrives.

It's snowing hard and fast, the kind of teeny-tiny flakes that feel like they've been crunched down into something like ice, and they bounce off his windshield with a rat-a-tat-tat that is starting to drive him crazy. The heavy snow, in combination with the dark, cloudy night sky, makes visibility nearly impossible, and he swerves to avoid hitting signposts more than once on the annoyingly curvy country roads. What concerns him most, however, is his tires - they're built for city driving and don't have enough traction to get him much further if the snow keeps falling at this rate. For this reason, he drives carefully, quite intent on avoiding the unpleasantness of skidding out and getting caught in a snowdrift overnight. In fact, he's alarmed to realize that since_ (d/dt)*h*(t) = k_, and _µk = F / N_, and since the snow is falling at about half a centimeter per minute, he only has about 20 minutes before the coefficient of kinetic friction in his tires is not enough to keep his car on the road at _all. _(And _yes,_ he calculated that in his head, and, by the way, did he happen to mention he is _brilliant_?)

Thankfully, he can just make out a sign for a B&B up ahead, and pulls in to the parking lot. It appears to be some sort of an old converted farmhouse, and he's certainly not lucky enough for it to actually be the lodge at Swinhope Moor where he booked a room, but it's _something_, and that's good enough. He supposes he'll spend the night here, and figure the rest out later. He always does, after all.

Clearly, he doesn't have a reservation, but the parking lot appears to be rather empty (or what he _hopes_ is the parking lot seems rather empty - with the snow already carpeted several centimeters thick over the ground, he can't be completely certain). He parks and gets out of the car slowly, stretching his long, lean frame before grabbing his duffel bag and heading towards the entrance with an optimistic jaunt in his step.

The door is unlocked, and a little bell chimes as he lets himself inside the building as if to alert the proprietor of his presence. The inside of the B&B is deliciously warm in contrast to the brutal weather outside, and is decorated in what strikes him as a quaint country fashion that he's never seen closer to his home in London. The low, almost-dim lighting in the entrance underscores the old, rustic feel of the place, and he looks around, curious. The small reception area opens to an even smaller dining room, with a sitting room complete with a wood-burning fireplace off to the side. The entire place looks small, and worn, but cozy. He looks around but doesn't see anyone here at all.

"Hello?" he asks, into the air.

He soon gets a response - all of a sudden he hears the clear sound of footsteps clattering down a staircase.

"Coming - just a minute!" a female voice yells.

A moment later, bounding down stairs that he hadn't even noticed off in the corner, is a young woman with shoulder-length blonde hair. She appears to be in her late teens or early twenties, and she looks up at him, a bit breathless, as she wipes her hands on her blue jeans, straightens her T-shirt a little self-consciously, and tucks back a few wayward strands of her hair behind her ear.

"Sorry 'bout that, I only just got in! Can I help you?" she says, eyes friendly and bright.

"Uh, yes. My name is John Smith. I'm afraid I don't have a reservation, I was hoping to get to the ski lodge at Swinhope Moor but couldn't quite find it in this weather," he says, motioning to the window at the increasingly heavy snowfall.

She smiles, and for a moment it seems like the whole room brightens.

"You would've passed it about a kilometer back, it's not very well marked. I'll call them, make sure they know you're here, and we'll get a room set up for you, if you want?"

He nods and can't help smiling back at her.

"Your name's John, you said?"

"Yes ... John Smith," he says as she nods and hands him a pen, motioning for him to sign the guest register. "And I'm sorry, what's your name?"

Her face breaks into a smile again.

"My name's Rose."


	2. Chapter 2

As he fills out the paperwork Rose has motioned to, he answers the typical questions he expects of a form like this, though he hasn't been asked to fill out an actual _paper _form in years now: name, address, phone number, intended length of stay. He supposes he'll just stay here the night then move to the lodge tomorrow, but he puts a question mark as the answer. He's a little surprised to be asked about his favorite meals and to see that the Prentice B&B makes all meals to order here, as B&Bs typically have their own menu based on local tastes and culture, and while guests certainly have input, they often just have the choice of either eating it, or eating elsewhere. He thinks that should be particularly true in a remote place like this. Eager to finish the form, he writes 'banana pancakes' for favorite meal just so he can be _done _with it.

He pauses at the question about what brings him to Weardale in the first place: he'd feel a little foolish writing "_in love with a woman who assumes I can ski, so I'm trying to not embarrass myself in front of her_." Clearly, he can't write _that_.

Instead, he writes "_learning more about Weardale, and learning to ski_." There. Much less pathetic. It's hardly _inaccurate_, considering how much time he'd spent trying to navigate the damn roads in the first place he feels like he already knows quite a bit about the place.

His eyes linger for a moment on the kitschy 1950s-style logo greeting customers at the bottom of the page, and he smiles a little at the novelty.

Meanwhile, Rose grabs a stack of towels, a room key, and a wireless phone from underneath the desk. Tucking the phone between her chin and shoulder, she begins to head up the slightly creaky staircase and he hears her speak as he finishes up the paperwork.

"Mickey, is that you? It's Rose. Listen - yeah I got home safe, thanks - ok, listen, John Smith is here. He's staying here tonight 'cos of the storm," she pauses for a moment and he hears her soft laugh trickle down the hallway. "Yeah, you too. Ok thanks, see you tomorrow."

Finally finished, he puts his pen and paper down on the small front desk, setting it next to a basket full of small crystals. There's a sign on the basket that reads _"BONNIE BITS, _£_1 each", _which he supposes must be a local phrase because he's never heard of it before. The gemstones themselves inside the basket are pink and yellow, some gently flecked with what looks like gold dust but which he knows is far more likely to be cheap pyrite, better known as Fool's Gold.

After perusing the basket, he walks across the room, still waiting for Rose to return. As he looks more closely at his surroundings, he thinks this feels a little like stepping back in time, with the homey, rustic feel of this place, its classic old-time logo and family feel. The carpets look old and a little worn, but clean, and the thick curtains are a slightly garish shade of blue that doesn't quite match the surrounding decor.

On one wall hang several black-and-white photos of the old Weardale mining camps he'd vaguely heard about before booking his trip here. Clusters of dour-looking mine workers alongside their families and children looked starkly out from the photos, clearly taken in the heyday of the Weardale mines. He idly wonders what happened to all these people, as Weardale is now basically a ghost town except for the small ski industry, but his eyes soon wanders past the photos and onto the next item of interest on the wall.

Near the photos of the mine is a large, garish, somewhat odd-looking plaque with a large shiny pink crystal proudly cemented into the middle. "_WEARDALE - FLUORITE CAPITOL OF THE UNITED KINGDOM_". He considers it for a moment, somewhat entranced by the large, angular stone, and then moves on.

On the rest of the walls hang a collage of more modern family portraits and photos, some of them taken in the B&B (he recognizes the awful curtains), or outside of it with the sign in the background (he's right of course, and it _is_ a converted farmhouse). Several of the pictures feature ski slopes or skiiers; one of them is a picture of a young blonde girl in a pink skisuit with matching hat and skiboots, holding up a shiny trophy and grinning broadly at the camera. He walks over to it and can't help smiling back at the photo, half-wondering by her big smile if it's a younger version of the girl he just met.

Soon he hears her quick step descending the staircase once more, coming to a slow halt behind him. He turns around slowly and catches her gaze to find her smiling at him.

"All set then?" she asks, and for a moment he's not sure what she means until he remembers the paperwork she'd handed him.

"Oh, right! Yes," he replies, heading back towards the desk and handing her the completed form. She looks over the page for a moment, and pauses, smiling slightly to herself as her eyes linger over the question about what brings him to Weardale.

"S'nice," she finally says, still smiling, eyes flicking up to meet his. "Not a lot of people nowadays are interested in learning about towns like this anymore. We'll make sure to show you around, if you want."

He can't help smiling back at her in assent, though he feels a little disingenuous.

She hands him the room key, a simple Yale key on a chain, and motions for him to follow her up the staircase. Grabbing his bag, he gladly obliges. It's a wider staircase than he would have expected in such an old house, and they're able to walk side by side up the stairs. On the wall by the stairs is a scattered, busy patchwork of more photos, old and new, detailing the history of both Weardale and the family photos taken in and around the Prentice B&B.

"Did you grow up here?" he asks.

"Yeah," she responds softly, motioning to a slightly faded photo of a large group picnic taken outside the B&B.

She points to a little girl in the photo with brown hair, "That's me. Place's been in my family for years now. My grandpa runs it mainly, but I help him out."

He nods, and they fall into silence.

"Anyway," she says, eyes nervously fluttering away from his, across the other photos, then towards a closed door. "Your room is the first door on the right. If you need anything, just call extension 1, it goes straight to my room. Breakfast starts at 7, so ..."

She breaks off and smiles.

"I'll leave you to it then. Goodnight John."

"Goodnight Rose, and thank you."

He smiles back at her, stepping towards his room, turns the key in the Yale lock and steps inside.

She lingers in the hall for a moment longer, hands shoved slightly awkwardly in her pockets, then heads back downstairs.

o-O-o-O-o

The room is average-sized and plain, completely unremarkable and exactly what he expected. More local pictures on the wall, more oddly-colored curtains, more slightly creaky floorboards. He peers briefly out the window, and although it's dark, he can still see the snow falling heavily, tiny white specks against the black sky. Good ski weather at least, he supposes, assuming he can even get his car there tomorrow.

He tosses his bag on the floor with a sigh, then flops on the bed and stretches his long limbs out. It feels amazing, actually, to finally lie down: he hadn't realized he'd felt so tense and achy on the drive up. The mattress is certainly quite comfortable, and he slowly lets himself relax, soon falling asleep.


	3. Chapter 3

John wakes up early – well, early for _him_ at any rate – to sunlight streaming in through a gap where the curtains of his room haven't completely closed. Rising slowly, he realizes he hadn't even changed out of his clothes from last night. He sighs, stretches, and shuffles over to the window. Parting the curtains slowly, his sleep-bleary eyes blink rapidly, adjusting to the light.

It's almost breathtaking, he thinks. Now that it's daylight, he can see all the way to the horizon. The land here stretches out flat and static for what looks like several kilometers, then sweeps down into sudden valleys and back up into gently rolling hillside. There are barely any trees, and the few leafless ones he does see dot the landscape sparsely. It's a cloudy day, with the sun peeking out, and it glistens off the snow-covered earth like diamonds.

It's clearly not the Alps, he thinks, but it's lovely all the same.

However, he can't help but note with a small grimace, as far as the eye can see, everything is coated in a thick blanket of snow high enough to come up to the bumper of his car. He can't even see where the road is, as neither it nor the parking lot has been plowed. In fact, as far as the eye can see, _nothing _has been plowed, he notes with a sinking feeling. There appear to be multiple sets of twin parallel lines in the snow, which he assumes to be ski tracks, headed from the front door of the B&B in various directions. Other than that the snow is pristine, and completely undisturbed. This does not bode well for getting to his ski lesson: he can hardly ski his way out of here as others appear to have done, since he has no idea _how _to ski in the first place.

With another sigh he ambles over to the en-suite, strips off his clothes, and steps into the shower. The water is mercifully hot, kneading out the last of the kinks in his muscles from the long car ride yesterday. It feels fantastic. He chocks it up to his imagination, but the water almost feels _different _here than in London. It's not the water pressure, or the showerhead, it's something that feels almost energizing about the way the water hits and pings off his body like tiny little starbursts, and then evaporates, misting hazily in the air around him. He can't put his finger on it, but it feels like anticipation, like adventure. He shakes his head, knowing exactly how daft that sounds even in his own head. Must be just his excitement at finally learning how to ski for Chamonix.

After getting dressed in jeans and a jumper (what the hell are you _supposed _to wear to a ski lesson?) he saunters downstairs for breakfast.

Arriving in the front hall, John looks around briefly but doesn't see Rose anywhere, doesn't see _anyone_ anywhere. He hears some rattling noises that appear to be coming from the kitchen, so he heads that way. Ducking his head through an open doorway, he sees a white-haired man in an apron scrubbing busily at a pile of dishes over a sink.

"Hello! Sorry to disturb you but I heard someone in here –" John says apologetically with a wave.

The man turns suddenly with a big smile.

"Well hello! My name's Wilf, welcome to the Prentice B&B," the white-haired man says, rinsing off his soapy fingers, striding over to John and reaching out to shake his hand. "You must be John Smith, Rose was telling me we got a surprise guest in last night! Would you like some breakfast?"

"Yes, wonderful, thank you,"

"Banana pancakes with whipped cream and buttermilk, right?" Wilf says, taking a dishrag and drying off a freshly washed pancake pan.

John starts a little, surprised that Wilf would know about his breakfast of choice, then quickly remembers he'd answered a question about his favorite foods on the paperwork he'd filled out the night before. He smiles, finding this gesture a bit touching, even though he'd only just met these people. Still... he's seems to be the only guest here now, and although he is paying to stay here, he truly doesn't want to impose on this man's generosity. Something about seeing the older man go out of his way like that for him, completely unnecessarily, just to provide him with a breakfast he'd ordered on a whim, makes John feel like a bit of an ass for writing it down in the first place.

"You don't need to cook anything special for me," John says. "Tea and cereal would do just fine, that's what I usually have."

Wilf shakes his head and continues gathering ingredients: bananas and eggs and flour and sugar and baking powder and begins making the breakfast from scratch. It smells _delicious_.

"Oh it's no bother. Most of our guests get up at daybreak for skiing, they're long gone so it's only you and me here for now. Besides, we were out of bananas so I took the snowmobile out to the general store first thing this morning, so you might as well eat!" Wilf says with a laugh.

Now he _really_ feels like an ass for writing it down in the first place. He's all of a sudden struck with the thought that he should be _helping_.

After a moment, Wilf adds, "Rose'll be back in a bit, she went out to arrange about your lesson. Might as well eat up for it, you'll need the energy."

John raises his eyebrows, grateful that Rose had seen fit to look after him this way, but it surprises him even more than the offer of banana pancakes: his ski lessons would seem to be no concern of hers at all.

"Well … that's very kind of her. My lesson is supposed to be at Swinhope Moor, I'm just not sure how I'll get there with the snow this deep," John says. He doesn't want to complain, can't complain – Wilf is far too kind already – but the drive up here was brutal and he'd hate for it to be all for naught.

Wilf shrugs and gives him a smile as the grill begins to sizzle.

"You'll be fine, it's still early. Rose'll get you sorted," Wilf says, unconcerned. "Rodrigo will be by later today with the lorry, he'll get it plowed."

Soon thereafter, John digs in to the delicious pancakes, the first home-cooked breakfast he's had in years.

0-0-0-0-0-0

Later, as he gratefully helps Wilf clear the plates from the table – which he had to do rather insistently, mind, as Wilf was intent on doing it himself and not letting John lift a finger – the bell on the front door rings, signaling an arrival. Soon Rose's voice rings out: "Gramps, I'm back, I've got the ski – "

She enters the kitchen, trussed out in a hot pink snowsuit, snowflakes sprinkled across her hat and hair.

She raises an eyebrow and gives a big grin to the sight she sees, John and Wilf standing side by side by the sink, Wilf washing while John dries.

"You have a new employee, hmm?" she teases.

Wilf turns to face her with a look of faux accusation on his face.

"See now Rose, this young man has only been here for 1 day –"

"Not even, Wilf, twelve hours more like – "

"Twelve hours, Rose!" Wilf nods emphatically. "And he's already spending more time with me here in the kitchen than you do in a month!"

"That's because I can't cook, Gramps. One meal from me, and all our guests would leave us and go stay at Swinhope Lodge," Rose laughs, leaning up against the doorframe.

Wilf laughs along with her, and John suddenly feels a little bad about his initial plan to stay here just for the night then move to the Lodge today. Not that he even _could_, with his car still buried, but even so, he likes these people. It may be old here, but it's comfortable, and they're kind, and he doesn't want to take business away from them.

"Now dishes I'm good at – even _I _can't burn dishwater!" Rose says, stripping off her coat and hat and donning an apron. She playfully swats Wilf and motions that he should go sit down, then she takes his place at the sink.

"You wash, I dry?" John asks her, and she responds by smiling up at him, surprised.

"Sure – can't say guests here help out often, but that would be great," she says, still holding his gaze a moment longer and smiling.

John can't help returning a smile back at her. He nods and continues drying the dishes at her side, having almost worked off his twinge of guilt over causing Wilf to make a special trip on his behalf. As he and Rose work in sync together, he decides this is the _oddest_ yet most enjoyable hotel stay he's had in a long time.

0-0-0-0-0-0

As the last plates are washed, dried, and put away on the shelf, Rose leans back against the counter and begins to untie her apron.

"So," she says, brushing a few strands of stray hair out of her eyes, "are you ready for your ski lesson?"

John frowns, a little puzzled. "Well, I would be, but there's no getting to Swinhope Moor yet, is there?"

She grins up at him, that bright megawatt grin he's been seeing so regularly all morning, except this time there's something almost mischievous about the look in her eyes.

"Well, you're lucky then, because the ski instructor you were assigned to at Swinhope Moor just so happens to be here at the Prentice B&B."

He brightens visibly – perhaps he can still make some progress skiing today after all!

"Really?" he smiles. "Who would that be?"

Her impossibly big smile gets even bigger.

"Me!" she says.


	4. Chapter 4

Slightly surprised by this turn of events, he follows her back into the front hall, which was empty a few minutes ago as he was eating breakfast. Now a myriad of ski equipment clutters it: two pairs of skis, with matching boots, and ski-poles, lean up intermingled against the wall. John swallows, excited to learn - he loves learning, always has - but he's nervous at the same time. He's completely out of his element here, and can barely put a name to some of the equipment. It's an odd feeling, one he's not used to - he's not completely sure he minds it, though.

"I picked up your rental equipment at the Lodge this morning - skis, poles, and boots, right?"

John nods, a little bit dumbfounded. Suddenly a thought occurs to him: this pile of equipment is _huge_.

"Hold on - you skied there and back?" he asks, bewildered. "How did you carry all this back with you?"

She shrugs. "Makeshift backpack," she says, and leaves it at that.

He barely knows her, but he finds he's growing more and more impressed with Rose Tyler by the minute.

The front hall has no seating, and is a bit small for them to have enough space to put on all their equipment, so he follows Rose through the kitchen and out into a small, add-on garage. With practiced motion, she carries her own equipment in one hand, skis perched expertly over her shoulder, base to base. He insists on carrying his own equipment and tries to mimic her motion, though it feels awkward and he's sure he doesn't look as casually confident as she does. Why he's even _worried _about what he looks like is a mystery to him - she's his instructor after all, she knows he's a complete novice. He just doesn't want to look like a fool, he supposes.

She leans her load against the garage wall and John does the same. Rose motions to a narrow wood plank bench alongside the garage wall and he sits on it. He waits _almost _patiently, watching her as she turns a crank to open the garage door, letting in both light as well as tufts of snow from the snowdrift that had accumulated by the door overnight. Ambling back towards John, she picks up the ski boots he'd left with the rest of the equipment by the wall and hands them to him.

"Here," she says. "Try these on and let me know how they feel."

They spend a good five minutes with him sitting on the bench and Rose on the floor at his feet, helping him with his ski boots, making sure they're the right fit and size. Then she asks him to walk around the garage for an additional few minutes, inquiring repeatedly about how the boots feel on his toes, heels, and instep. He tries to reassure her that she really doesn't need to bother, he's sure they'll be suitable and they seem to fit just fine - they _look_ just fine, after all, but she overrides his objections.

"Making sure you have the right fit ... 's really important," she insists, though her eyes are gentle and almost apologetic.

"How so?" he asks, sitting down on the bench to be at eye level with her as they talk; he _wants_ to know, after all.

"The ski is like an extension of your foot," she explains, her voice taking on a slightly wistful tone. "It's like... you're out there on the slopes, and sometimes, well a _lot _of times, you're going a little fast, and it's wild and it's beautiful out there, but it can be dangerous. It can be more than you can handle sometimes, if you're not expecting it. You need a boot that fits right, that's how you control how fast you're going. That's how you end up where you want to be on the slope, and not in a ditch somewhere - and trust me, that happens!" she laughs.

He smiles, and lets her continue her adjustments until she's satisfied.

Standing up, she helps him to his feet, takes a step back, and looks at him deliberatively, hands on her hips, biting her lip slightly. All of a sudden she breaks into a smile.

"You're going to get soaked in those jeans!" she laughs. "You definitely need real ski wear. How many lessons did you plan to book?"

"Twelve," he responds, having the number of weeks til Chamonix seared in his mind.

She nods and looks him over once again. If her gaze lingers on him just a moment longer than necessary, he doesn't notice.

"You'll want some proper ski wear then. Something waterproof but breathable. They have a small store up at Swinhope Moor, but you'd get a better selection if you bought something in London and just brought it with you next week. You'll need proper ski-pants, gloves, and you'll need a waterproof jacket too. A helmet wouldn't be a bad idea either, just to be safe."

He nods, mentally making a note to buy all of the items she's listed. Except the helmet - he shudders to think what that would do to his hair.

"We can start here, maybe head off to the lodge later today or tomorrow morning. We've got a small hill in the back that would be good practice for you later today or tomorrow, but first we'll learn some basics."

She picks up his skis and he follows her to the garage doorway, where a gentle breeze has begun to blow in a few rogue snowflakes from the snowdrift outside. The ground outside is perfectly flat, but Rose had said they were starting with 'basics' so he supposes this is what she intends. She places his skis on the snow in front of him, about shoulder-width apart. He excitedly takes a deep breath because _this is it_, an adventure in the making, and one that will soon hopefully lead him to a new, to an even _better_ adventure together with Jeanne, thanks to Rose's help.

She hands him his ski poles, instructing him to put his weight on them. She then helps him guide first one boot into the ski bracing, snapping it into place, and then the other boot. Within moments, he certainly _looks_ the part of a skier, but looks of course can be highly deceiving. As Rose puts on her own skis, John notes that the ski poles have wrist-straps attached to them. Intending to secure himself to them, especially on his first day, he begins to wrap it around his wrist and clasp it in place.

"Don't use the wrist-strap around here," Rose's voice pipes up as he's in the middle of fastening it. "Never when you're off-piste like this. That's lesson number one. On the slopes it's OK, but around here ... there could be branches or roots under the snow. The pole could get caught on something. I've seen people break their wrist that way."

John nods, absorbing every word. This is completely new to him, alien and foreign, and it should put him on edge: after all, he hates feeling like he is outside his comfort zone. Instead, it feels glorious.

Rose has him glide forward several metres, instructing him to _glide_ his skis forward using his poles for balance. Her mouth quirks up in a smile as he initially attempts to lift his skis and _walk_ the distance.

"First thing you need to do," she says, skiing in front of him a few additional meters before turning around gracefully, her hair dancing in the light breeze behind her. "You need to learn how to fall."

"To _fall_?" he asks, a bit surprised, having only just managed to stand. Wasn't keeping one's balance the point of this?

"Yup," she replies. "You need to learn how to fall, because you _will_ fall, and the most important thing you need to do is to learn how to get back up again."

She smiles at him, a tongue-touched grin, and he finds himself smiling back at her reflexively.

They spend the rest of the day falling, and getting up, and learning to hop in place, and falling multiple more times (_accidentally _he admits) and getting up yet again, until Wilf calls them in that it's time for tea. It astonishes him – he thought he was pretty good at keeping track of time, but his lesson with Rose has sped by so fast it seems like it lasted only a brief moment.

He comes in wet, and tired, and freezing, and achy, but grinning like a loon.


	5. Chapter 5

After tea (and a change of clothes), John is eager to get back outside and continue their lesson. There's still so much he wants to learn: simply learning the proper way to fall while on skis is all fine and good, but Rose had promised him he could try a real, genuine hill this time, and he's not about to miss it for the world. He still doesn't enjoy feeling like a novice, but he finds he quite likes the idea of skiing, especially how Rose has described it. There's something that feels a little wild about this, not only braving the harsh elements, but indeed laughing in Mother Nature's face a bit, by strapping on skis to make the slick snow even slicker, racing down a slope and making the chill winds cut even colder against his skin.

It feels free and exhilarating, even – both of which are certainly lacking in his day-to-day life back in the city, as he plods from office to flat to office, occasionally with some beans on toast thrown in there for good measure. Oh he loves London, always has, but this - _this _- is a little bit of danger, a little bit of risk - and it lights something inside him he didn't know existed.

"I gotta say, it's been a long time since I've met a new skier who's been so dedicated - 4 hours of lessons, in one day!" Rose says with a smile, casting a coy sidelong glance at him as they get their gear and go back outside, traisping side by side through the snow.

It's even colder now than it was earlier in the day, and when they exhale their breath mists into tiny, cool crystals. Although the sun is still out, the shadows of the leafless trees outside are lengthening, almost reaching the base of the small hill. They won't have much time together out here, but John means to make the most of it.

"Wellll, I've always been a star pupil, especially when I have an excellent teacher," he quips back with a wink.

She just laughs, a small, almost self-deprecating chortle, but a small blush colors her cheeks, and John chocks it up to the biting cold weather.

For the next hour, she teaches him the wedge position with his skis. It feels terribly awkward and he feels like a gangly pigeon, pointing his feet inwards and squatting slightly, but Rose seems pleased with his progress, he learns how to stop while skiing, and he even makes it down the hill once without falling. Granted, it takes him ten tries, but Rose cheers and gives him a big hug in congratulations – which surprises him slightly, but he hugs her back, happy and proud of his own progress.

After an hour outside, he's flushed and sweaty yet freezing, his clothes once again caked with snow that is slowly melting and turning his jeans stiff with wet, slushy frost. At this point, after sizing up his appearance with a frown, Rose insists they go back inside.

"Best not overdo it on your first day," she advises. "You'll be sore enough as is, and you've got that long car ride back tomorrow. Besides, Gramps will have dinner ready soon!"

John is disappointed, oddly enough he's having the time of his life, but he doesn't argue – much. He fancies himself brilliant, mind, and generally in circumstances such as this he'd press on regardless of what an 'instructor' would say - John would prove his point, show his superior intellect and get his way. But … there's something about Rose. He barely knows her, but somehow, almost instinctively, he trusts her judgment.

John's clothes are completely drenched by the time he gets indoors, the frost quickly melting on his jeans, making them heavy and wet. When he goes back upstairs, he's annoyed to find that his jeans from earlier today still aren't dry, either. He hadn't thought to pack more than 2 changes of clothes, and all he has is his pajamas... with a sigh, he puts them on and heads down to dinner.

Rose quirks an eyebrow as he sheepishly descends the staircase for dinner in just a pair of thin, striped pajama pants and a plain tee shirt, then offers to toss his jeans in the clothes dryer, an offer to which John gladly agrees. As she darts to the laundry room with his jeans, he attempts to suavely take his place at the dinner table in his pajamas.

Dinner is a small affair, just John, Wilf, Rose and two other guests, a husband-and-wife skiing couple from the city of Durham, close to an hour's car ride away from Weardale.

"So how long have you owned this place, Wilf?" the husband asks.

"Oh, let's see," says Wilf with a sigh, drawing his hand over his face as he considers the question. "This land goes farther back in my family than I can remember, generations really. It was a farm first, corn I think, back in the 1700s – we were all Prentices back then, mind! That's how the farm got its name. Then, mining started to bring more people into town, and that made a better living for folks, so most of the young men started to work the mines. We've been a B&B now for about 50 years, give or take, since the mines closed. But you know about that I'm sure," Wilf says with a small chuckle, although he doesn't seem to be trying to be funny.

Wilf looks back and forth towards the man and the woman, eyes bright, as if he is happy to answer any questions and perhaps even would welcome them. But the couple both nod pleasantly, and go back to concentrating on their dinner. It strikes John that they might have not been interested in the question at all in the first place, really, and might have been just trying to make polite conversation. But Wilf's silence leaves a void at the table, like there's a question waiting to be asked, a story waiting to be told. John looks back towards the other room, towards the mining paraphernalia on the walls, the "bonnie bits" (whatever the hell _those _were) for sale at the front desk, the old portraits of mining families still hanging on the walls, decades after they'd left town for god-knows-where, and his curiosity is piqued.

"I actually don't know – what happened to the mines?" John asks, not even sure why he cares. Twenty-four hours ago he's pretty sure _he _wouldn't have given a damn either.

"They shut down," Rose says. "Too expensive to keep them open, especially when people could get fluorite and lead for cheaper from other places. At least, that's what my dad always said."

He means to ask her about that, especially about her father, as it just seems to be Rose and Wilf here now - but the wife from Durham soon asks for a glass of sparkling water, and Rose excuses herself from the table to get it for her.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

After dinner, Wilf offers the guests a drink in the sitting room. There's a distillery near Consett, a relatively short ride from Weardale, and Wilf has an array of locally-made beers and ciders. The couple from Durham decline and head upstairs, eager to get to bed early to maximize their ski time tomorrow. John knows he needs to head back to London early in the morning as well, but he gladly accepts Wilf's offer, and he heads to the sitting room with Wilf and Rose.

It's not a large room, but it's impressive nonetheless. The floors are old-style wooden planks, polished to a satiny amber, and the original thick wooden wall beams have been left exposed. A comfortable-looking blue sofa, and a slightly worn-looking brown easy chair are the main furnishings in the room. There's a large, antique clock prominently tick-tocking against the wall opposite the fireplace, which is fantastic in and of itself.

"The only rule we have is that the easy chair belongs to Gramps!" Rose laughs, as Wilf hands the cold glasses of beer around and nestles in to what is clearly his favorite place to sit.

"That's a lovely fireplace," John says, partly because he means it – it _is_ lovely, made of rugged, mixed stones, and is extraordinarily wide and deep – and partly because it's an excuse for him to scoot closer to it. He's cold, and the beer is cold, which is only making him shiver more. His thin pajama pants are meant for summer weather, and his body still remembers the chill from earlier outdoors. He declines a seat on the sofa and instead sits cross-legged on the floor a respectable distance from the flames, holding the chilled beverage in his hands.

"It's the original," Rose says, plopping herself down on the floor as well and smiling at the impressed look on his face. "Used to be used for cooking, back in the 1700s when the farm was first built. It's still functional, even – never know when someone will ask for a genuine roast."  
John nods, staring wonderingly at the hearth, and gathers his knees closer up towards his chest.

Rose laughs softly, "You look like you're freezing," she says.

"Me?" he knits his eyebrows together and feigns surprise, and doesn't manage to suppress a small shiver.

"You can use this, if you want," she says – and there's that smile again! It's the one with the tongue, and he knows, even this soon after meeting her, that it's the smile she gives him when she's quite enjoying a laugh at him. "I do, when I'm cold…"

She leans over and opens up a small, antique-looking chest next to the sofa, then tosses something fluffy and pink at him.

A. Hot. Pink. _Snuggie_.

He rolls his eyes, but her eyes are mirthful and he finds he very much likes making her laugh, so he grins and puts it on anyway as they finish their beverages.


	6. Chapter 6

True to Wilf's word, Rodrigo has the parking lot plowed that night, and even goes to the trouble of excavating John's car. Of course, John doesn't notice any of this until the next morning, when he wakes with a yawn, a stretch, and a smile, and plods over to the window to survey the outdoors. His breath fogs the window slightly, and he sees that the snow seems not to have melted at all – if anything, it looks _more_ frozen, coated with a thin layer of morning dew and glistening prettily. From his vantage point, the roads still don't seem _well_ plowed, but are certainly serviceable enough to get him home to London. He notes that except for the same ski tracks he'd noticed yesterday, the snow hardly seems disturbed at all. He thinks of how in London, by now it would be tamped down, dirty and grey under the weight of thousands of shoes and shovels and grimy cars, and wonders slightly that this is still pristine and glistening white. It's one of the many things that makes him feel like he's taken a step back in time when coming up here: this hardly seems like the 21st century at all. It feels like a land of pioneers and fresh starts, set apart from his real life in London, and he's suddenly doubly glad he's keeping this little adventure to himself.

He repacks his few belongings, then descends the staircase with his duffel bag, feeling a momentary regret that the weekend has flown by so fast. Having originally intended his trip here to just be a means to an end of being closer with Jeanne, he's surprised to find that he's enjoyed it as much as he had. He's also surprised to find he's enjoyed _skiing _as much as he had as well, and hopes it will be even better in the future, with more training from Rose and proper equipment.

After a quick breakfast of tea and cereal (which he'd _insisted_ on, rather than have Wilf spend so much time making him yet another elaborate meal), he's ready to go and shuffles over to the front desk with his bag. Yet again, he and Wilf seem to be the only people at the B&B – everyone else appears to already be gone for the day, or still sleeping.

"Thank you for coming, we hope you enjoyed your stay," Wilf says with a smile, bustling behind the desk to finalize John's checkout.

"I certainly did," John muses, eyes scanning quickly around the room.

"Looking for Rose?" Wilf asks.

John looks at him, startled. It's not like he was looking for anyone in _particular, _mind, and Wilf's question surprises him slightly.

"She took the other couple who is staying here up over to Swinhope Moor early this morning," Wilf says. "She won't be back til later – did you want to leave a message for her?"

John shakes his head in a silent no. It's not like he has anything particularly _important_ to say to her, she's just his instructor after all, and he'll see her in another week's time, anyway. And it's not like he was even _looking _for her to begin with, after all.

As Wilf hands John his receipt with a smile on his face, John asks if he could book a room for the next weekend as well, and Wilf's smile gets even bigger.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

He goes to work on Monday sore and achy just as Rose had warned him, and soon receives news guaranteed to make him even _more_ sore and achy. It comes in the form of a memo in his office mailbox, on a blindingly yellow sheet of paper that hurts his eyes a little with its faux perkiness. Everyone in the physics department has to pack up their offices and move to a mobile building, for some nebulously-phrased reason having to do with construction and personnel safety. To John, all it means is more work and inconvenience. He's suddenly glad Rose made him stop skiing when she did – his legs and back are _already _sore and _now _he apparently needs to spend the rest of the day sorting ten years' worth of belongings from his office.

He's sitting at his soon-to-be-former desk, trying to decide how the _hell_ to box up a prism spectrophotometer, when a knock on his open door grabs his attention.

His eyes flick to the doorway and he smiles softly as he takes in the sight of Jeanne, leaning against the doorframe, ankles casually crossed and looking at him with a wry smile.

"What've you been up to?" she asks with a demure smile.

He shrugs, and leans back in his chair, attempting to duplicate her casual posture.

"This and that," he says with a grin.

Her smile broadens at this, and she enters his office and perches on the edge of his desk. She doesn't wait for an invitation, which is all fine and good to him because she's never needed one as far as he's concerned. She smoothes the hem of her skirt then glances prettily back up at him.

"They're making the French department move today as well … would you help me move my desk? I'm afraid I'm not dressed for it," she says, pointing at her silk blouse and fitted skirt. She's wearing high heels, too, making her slender legs look even longer and more shapely. He tries not to stare, knowing he's failing badly and not quite caring. He may be achy, and the crick in his back may be throbbing viscerally at her request, but he nods gladly, happy to spend time with her.

As far as John's _own_ office move goes, he enlists two of his brightest students to help. It's nothing they _have_ to do of course, but he's their teacher and he's well aware they're unlikely to say no if he asks – especially if he offers them something in return. His two 'volunteers' are Clyde and Luke, who are best friends, although an unlikely duo in John's opinion. Clyde has always struck John as the more social, outgoing type, while Luke … well, Luke is _brilliant_, but never quite seemed to John to have Clyde's finesse in social situations. Somehow, this makes John like Luke all the more, and he's always wanted to take him under his wing a bit – and for John, this presents a perfect opportunity to do so. John promises both boys an opportunity to work with him on a research project – a highly coveted opportunity – and is pleased to see they've packed up his whole office (included that bloody prism spectrophotometer) by the time he's done helping Jeanne.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

That afternoon, on his way home from work, he stops by the Snow + Rock ski store, looking for the ski gear that Rose had recommended. Even for something as simple as ski pants, he finds the selection completely overwhelming. There are literally _racks_ of ski pants, which are apparently also called _salopettes_ from what he can tell, in all different materials and styles. Some even look like more like overalls with suspenders. He honestly doesn't know where to begin, and as the salesperson seems to be wanting to direct him to the most expensive options, he kindly tells her he's just looking and pulls out his mobile, dialing the number of the one person he hopes can help him sort this out.

It rings once before the call is picked up.

"Prentice B&B ... may I help you?"

"Nylon or polyester?" he chirps into his mobile.

"… pardon?" Rose asks, her voice sounding amused enough for him to feel confident that she knows _exactly _who is calling her and why, and the thought makes him smile into the phone.

"Ski pants," he says, as his fingers flip through another rack of microfiber microfleece.

"Nylon's better, it doesn't tear as easily. And get water_proof_ not water-resistant. Look for down or fleece insulation – especially if it has extra reinforcement in the seat, given how much you'll probably be falling if this past weekend was anything to go by."

He makes a shocked sound he intends to come off as outraged, but which instead sounds more like a mewling even to his own ears – and certainly to hers, by the laugh he gets in response.

"Oh! And try to get a pair that you can extend down over the top of your boots – they say the snow is supposed be deep around here this winter, so that will be a little better for you."

He wants to ask her about snow in the Alps, if the same type of pant would work just as well in Weardale as Chamonix – the ski wear is certainly expensive enough that he'd hate to have to buy multiple sets – but he's still a bit embarrassed to tell her the reason for his lessons, or frankly at this point to admit that he's even _going _to a resort aimed at accomplished skiers – which he most assuredly is _not _- so he decides against it.

By the time they're done with their conversation, it's been 45 minutes, and she's helped him pick out an entire ski wardrobe (having logged on to the store's website from the B&B for that express purpose, and _yes John_, there is internet access in Weardale). He rings off with a smile on his face, feeling inexplicably lighter than he has all day.


	7. Chapter 7

The rest of John's week goes by in a blur. He buys a copy of _SKI _magazine on his way home from the university and devours every article in it, from detailed discussions of ski techniques, to reviews of resorts he hasn't even _heard _of in the USA, and idly wonders if Rose has been to any of these far-off slopes. In fact, his entire week is inexplicably wrapped up in thoughts of skiing now, even more so than when he first decided to take lessons to impress Jeanne – he subscribes to a skiing newsletter, as well as a YouTube channel filled with tips for beginners. He finds he's quickly throwing himself fully into the process of becoming a skier – he wants to make every moment count in his lessons. After all, he's brilliant in absolutely everything else he does, why should skiing be any different? The fact that he's taking lessons at all is still a secret to nearly everyone – but it's _his _secret, and he cherishes it. It's already become a bit of an escape for him, the one bit of adventure he has, and he wants to keep it that way.

He packs up and leaves work early on Friday to make the trek back up to Weardale, hoping that if he gets there early enough, he might even get another one of Wilf's home-cooked meals, which certainly beats the leftover takeaway in his refrigerator. Nobody will miss him if he leaves early, anyway – Jeanne's office is unfortunately now clear on the other side of campus, and the only students who regularly come to his office are Luke and Clyde, whom he can easily set up with their much-desired project this weekend.

Arriving at the B&B several hours later, John casually strides up to the entrance. The door chime jangles as he saunters in, and he immediately sees Rose and Wilf sitting on the carpet in the sitting room, boxes and packing popcorn surrounding them, the unmistakeable scent of freshly-opened cardboard and shrinkwrap filling the room. There's a television on the carpet in front of them, and it's turned around to face the wall with its electronics panel exposed on the back.

Rose looks up inquisitively at the door from her place on the floor, clearly not expecting anyone this early in the day. When she meets John's eyes, her face instantly breaks into an impossibly big smile and she immediately rises, bounding over to greet him with a friendly wave. Wilf half turns around and gives John a smile and a cheery wave as well, but his attention is soon turned back to … whatever is currently captivating him.

"New telly?" John asks Rose as she arrives at his side. He nods at the boxes and electronic detritus still surrounding Wilf on the other side of the room.

Rose looks back over her shoulder towards her grandfather, who is still sitting on the carpet, reading glasses perched low on his nose and looking at what seems to be an instruction sheet.

"Sort of," Rose shrugs. "New Sky box, just connecting it all up to the telly and satellite before the guests arrive. Well, _most_ of the guests," she says with a small, almost self-conscious giggle, looking up at him with a raise of her eyebrows.

He grins cheekily back at her and she smiles up at him, biting her lip.

"Can I … can I get you something to drink?" she asks. "Tea … or beer, or I think we have some cider still, I was going to drive to the store a little later, but if you want I can –" her voice trails off.

He shakes his head, eyes fixed on Wilf, who is sitting on the floor, muttering something under his breath.

"Problem, Wilf?" John asks, striding over to the older man, hands in his pockets.

"These companies nowadays," Wilf says, putting down the sheet of paper, shaking his head and flipping through the packaging like he's looking for something. "Seems to be a missing piece here, or the cable's the wrong kind! Supposed to be full installation, they just drop off the box and leave!"

John plops to the floor unceremoniously beside Wilf and sits cross-legged on the carpet. He's only too glad for an opportunity to help out the older man, who went out of his way for John last week at breakfast. And, to be honest, John loves being a _bit _impressive with his knowledge of electronics, particularly with his new acquaintances as an audience. He whips his glasses out of his pocket in order to see the tiny threads on the cable better.

"It's the wrong type of connector," John says decisively, holding it up in his hand as Wilf and Rose nod in silent agreement, seeming slightly underwhelmed by his proclamation – that much, they'd _clearly_ gathered on their own. "Is this the only thing they gave you?"  
Wilf nods in silent assent.

"Well, easy enough fix, back in a 'mo," John says with a shrug, quickly rising to his feet.

Wilf opens his mouth to protest, but soon Rose is at her grandfather's side, whispering something into his ear and gently patting the back of the older man's armchair, motioning for him to sit down.

John jogs out to his car, opens the boot and grabs a wire with a coaxial coupler (_mercifully _he notices it has the RG6 connection he's looking for, a convenience that will save him a _lot _of time), a pair of side cutters, and a sautering iron, just in case. He comes back into the house and wordlessly sits cross-legged on the floor again, prying off the casing from the cable Wilf had been holding. He makes a series of small incisions into the coating of the wire, pulling it away and carefully peeling down the delicate copper braiding inside. He does the same with his own coaxial cable, before delicately prying the metal coupler off his own wire, and gently transferring the metal unit to touch the copper braiding on Wilf's Sky box.

Wilf takes a seat in his favorite brown chair, leaning back and watching John at work.

"You seem quite handy, there," says Wilf with a smile.

John shrugs nonchalantly – he's proud to be skilled, of course he is – but this truly feels like the least he can do to help Wilf and Rose, who have been so kind to him.

"Grew up building my own electronics – built my own robot when I was fifteen," he says proudly. "It was a little dog …" he trails off, lost for a moment in nostalgia.

"Anyway," he says with a sniff, "I still like to tinker, I suppose. Works out well. Can't get the university to replace hardly any equipment in our labs, so I upgrade most of it myself. It's a hobby … built my own car, even."

He looks over at Rose and finds her still looking at him, a thoughtful smile on her face, and he grins back at her.

The entire process takes under five minutes, and soon the telly and Sky box are connected and plugged in with John's new connectors. Wilf reaches for his remote control to power them on, and the telly flares to life. John smiles graciously as Wilf thanks him, then his eyes flick to Rose. She holds his gaze, giving him a small smile, and his own grows bigger in response. They stay like that – not in awkward silence, rather a comfortable one – for several moments until Wilf's voice breaks through.

"Need your key?"

John quickly turns around to face Wilf again, nodding yes.

Several minutes later, as John ascends the steps with his duffel bag in one hand and his Ski + Rock bag full of his ski attire in the other, Rose comes to stand at the bottom of stairs and softly clears her throat.

"I was going to head out … did you still want to see Weardale? I've got to go to the general store anyway. If you're not too tired of driving, I was thinking we could take the snowmobile into town. There's a pub that's open for dinner if you're hungry," she says, then stops, her eyes a little hesitant, until his face breaks into a grin, then she smiles back, almost in relief.

"Sounds brilliant! Never been on a snowmobile before," he says, taking the stairs two by two with new enthusiasm to drop his bags off before coming back downstairs to join her. Sure, he'd been originally planning on staying here for some of Wilf's cooking – but a ride on a snowmobile sounds fantastic. And he _did _want to see Weardale, his interest piqued from the memorabilia downstairs – Rose's company would make that exploration even more insightful.

When he returns, she's standing at the door, zipping up her pink ski jacket, and gives him yet another brilliant grin.

"Have fun, you two!" Wilf calls. "And Rose, don't you dare sucker that poor boy at darts!"

Rose laughs, walking over to Wilf, smoothing his white hair back and kissing him on the forehead.

"G'nite gramps, and thanks," she says, giving him a fond smile as she turns on her heel and heads out the door with John.

Wilf smiles for a moment after them as the door closes, then wriggles back in his easy chair for comfort, turns on the telly, and tries out his new Sky satellite box.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

The snowmobile is parked out front – a midnight blue contraption that looks to him like a riding lawnmower on skis. Not that he's even ridden on one of _those, _mind, living in the heart of the city and all. As she pulls on the clutch to start it, he thinks that it _sounds_ just like a riding lawnmower too. Ingenious invention, this, and he makes a note to himself to learn more about it. Rose reaches in to a compartment behind the main seat and pulls out two helmets – she tosses him a white one (which he grudgingly puts on, swallowing an apology to his hair) and puts the pink one on herself as she sits astride the snowmobile.

"Coming, then?" she smiles.

He swallows. He awkwardly straddles the snowmobile, sitting behind her, placing his arms tightly around her waist for support as the machine's engine roars beneath them. All of a sudden, they're off in a fast gust of snow and wind that cocoons their little snowmobile in a tiny cloud of misty frost and icy pebbles.

Somehow, _thankfully_, Rose can see exactly where she's going. At least, he hopes she can. She cuts a path through the trees, and soon they're on a well-worn, snow-covered trail. It's a thin trail, too narrow for his comfort, and is flanked on both sides by trees – conifers reaching out towards them with their stinging branches, and deciduous trees with their empty, leafless trunks leaning in their direction. They're driving fast, the low tree branches whipping over their heads like tiny wooden swords, and he leans down a little more closely into Rose. His heart is in his stomach and it's _wonderful_, but terrifying.

Soon – almost too soon – Rose reaches an open field, and they head towards a cluster of several buildings. She pulls up in front of one of them, an old stone building with a wood-shingled roof, that already has several other snowmobiles and lorries parked outside. She comes to a stop gently, idles the snowmobile and removes her helmet.

She tosses her hair and he muses that her smile is brighter than the sun.

"So? Whaddaya think?" she says, her eyes playful.

He steps off the snowmobile, and his legs suddenly feel like jelly.

"Oh it was lovely …" he says, trying to not stumble over his feet, as well as over his words. "This is Weardale, I take it?"

She nods.

"This is Stout Point, it's the local restaurant and pub," she says, pointing at the building in front of them, and he doesn't miss the way she says it's _the _restaurant, and not _one of the_ restaurants. "General store is down the street along with the post office and a few shops. There's even a local mining museum, but it's only open in the summer."

He nods, gazing briefly at his surroundings as she puts their helmets back in the snowmobile's center compartment and heads towards the door of Stout Point. He runs a hand through his hair reflexively and lopes behind her to catch up.

He's not sure what he's expecting as he heads inside – being the only local restaurant, he's certainly not expecting it to be particularly nice, but he's pleasantly surprised. The interior is reminiscent of a log cabin, with honey-colored timbers on the wall, floors and bar. There's mining paraphernalia on the walls as well – pictures similar to those at the Prentice B&B, but also small pieces of mining equipment nailed onto the wall – lamps and helmets and picks. It's neat, and homey, and spacious, and the restaurant area is nearly empty.

The bar area, however, is populated with several young men, all clustered around a television in the corner wall watching a football match. They all seem to recognize Rose, giving her quick, friendly hugs as she passes by. She briefly introduces John to them and he catches a few names – Mickey, Owen, Adam, Jimmy. John nods to them with a small wave, a gesture which seems to go largely unnoticed as they turn back towards the telly. Rose pulls a face and shrugs, then leads him over to a table in the quiet restaurant area. As he follows her, he gets the sense that someone is _looking _at him, and he turns around, but finds all the young men apparently fixated on the telly. He shrugs inwardly and turns back to follow Rose.

Soon they're settled at their table, each of them with an ale, and their dinner ordered.

"So, Rose Tyler," John says, leaning slightly towards her and letting he syllables roll off his tongue, emboldened by the thick ale warmly filling his veins and belly. "Tell me about _you_."

"Not much to tell," she smiles almost nervously into her drink, flicking her eyes up to meet his. "I've lived here since I was born. Been skiing since I was old enough to walk, wanted to go pro but I hurt my knee, so that's out. My folks are both gone now, Gramps is all I've got for family, really. I fill in now and then at Swinhope Moor when they need extra help, help out Gramps at the B&B, that's about it."

He means to ask about her parents, about her injury, about anything, really – but his mind latches on to the last thing she said, about simply 'filling in' places and his train of thought is out of his mouth like it's on a high-speed rail.

"How on earth do you make a living like that?" he blurts, and _oh no_, he can tell from how quickly her expression shuts down that he's been rude.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have –"

"No, it's ok," she says quickly, her smile still broad but not quite meeting her eyes, and she takes another sip of her drink.

He wishes he could reach out, rub that pretend smile off her face, and rub his words away while he was at it. He still hardly knows her, but he knows that her expression doesn't suit her at all, and he feels a twinge of guilt that he's the one who put it there. After a momentary pause, she opens her mouth again to speak.

"I mean … I wish I _could_ do more, get out there a bit. Not one for uni though, I s'pose … never got a chance to go, and it's not like I can do that anymore."

He looks at her, eyebrows slightly furrowed. "Of course you can, you can do anything you want to. You can apply next year! Or take lessons in the spring, and enroll officially the next year."

Rose shrugs, looking back down at her ale, almost ruefully.

"Nah … I haven't even gotten my A levels," she says, still staring at her ale, and her voice is all of a sudden softer.

"You don't need A-levels to get into some universities nowadays," he says. "It's _competitive_, yes, but you have a lot going for yourself! You're an instructor for one – and you're freelance, correct? So you're blazing your own trail, nothing's standing in your way – it's all you, taking on the world! _And _you've managed to get a clientele despite living far from a city, _and _without your parents. That's _brilliant_, Rose, truly."

The words leave his mouth breathy and rushed – and although he would say _anything _to make up for his previous remark, he finds as he says the words, that he really means them. She looks up for him, holding his gaze for a moment and smiles at him, a _genuine_ grin this time, and it warms him from within, his stomach flipping in gratitude that he could make her smile again after his rudeness.

"Besides," he sniffs. "Won't hurt if you have a highly esteemed, brilliant – quite undeniably _genius_ in fact – lecturer on your side putting in a good word for you."

"Yeah? And who would that be?"

He smiles at her again as he takes a sip of his ale, and she smiles back.

"Genius, hmmm … but are you any good at _darts_, John?"

He laughs, and she smiles wickedly – and he soon learns that the answer is a most definite, undeniable _no_.


	8. Chapter 8

After dinner, and after John's defeat six times to Rose's sniper-like markswoman-ship in darts, they leave the restaurant, waving a quick, casual goodbye to Mickey and Owen, the only remaining blokes at the bar, and getting a friendly wave in return. John is in good spirits, much better than he would normally be after being bested by someone at a game as _simple_ as darts, but he's enjoying himself far too much to care.

As they step outside from the warm foyer of Stout Point into the chilled outdoors, Rose nods down the street to the right, telling John there's more to see in that direction, and they head off, together. The sun is just starting to drop down towards the horizon, and the few old stone buildings lining their path cast their lonely shadows down towards the road. For such a quiet, empty street, it's an oddly compelling sight, and it makes John almost want to slow down to appreciate its stark beauty. John and Rose's breaths crystallize into tiny clouds around their faces, as their boots crunch and clomp at the snow under their feet, kicking it up into little white tufts with each step. The pair amble along the street together side by side, his hand almost touching hers until he realizes how close together they have been walking, and he shoves his hands into his jacket pockets.

"This is the museum," Rose says, soon coming to a stop before an old stone house with somewhat small, dingy windows. "It's closed for the winter, but they carry most of the brochures and history stuff about the area."

John leans in towards the front windows, but the inside of the place is dark, and shielded with heavy closed curtains, so he is unable to peer in to see what kinds of items the museum carries. Instead, he looks at the placard inside the window, advertising local history about fluorite and lead mining, a local history tapestry weaving, a chapel, and genealogy resources.

"Genealogy …" he murmurs to himself, raising his eyebrows, not expecting that from a museum. Then again, he would hardly have expected a _tapestry _from a museum, either.

Rose laughs. "Yeah, I 'spose. Although I think most people who were born around here end up staying around here, so our family trees aren't much of a mystery. Our great-grandparents all were locals here too – most of them were friends, so we already know all the old family stories. I think it's more of a hobby for the owner."

"Must be nice," John muses, still looking at the window, not finding it nearly as kitschy as he thinks even Rose might. "I'm not even sure I know my great-grandparents _names_. Pretty sure they were all from London though, I think. _Well_, maybe. Hard to say, really, and there's no-one around to ask anymore."

Rose looks up at him suddenly, eyes wide with empathy and hesitation.

"I'm so sorry – you mean your family –"

He shrugs, and Rose falls into silence to let him speak as he stands still, hands in his pockets, his eyes remaining fixed on the placard in the window.

"It was a long time ago," he says in a casual voice, smooth with ease from long-practiced repetition. "It's just me, now."

Rose is quiet in response to this, and for a moment he wonders if she heard him at all. After a minute he turns his eyes from the placard, his gaze dropping down to meet her own, and finds her eyes full of silent understanding. It catches him by surprise and he swallows, looking away awkwardly, back towards the placard in the empty building.

"I know it's not much but … I mean, you can come here whenever you want, you know," she says quietly and quickly. "Me and gramps, it's just us left, too."

He smiles down at her, a genuine grin, and she blushes. All of a sudden _she_ seems to be the one looking awkwardly away, although a smile still lingers on her face.

"You've got a nice town here," he says, changing the topic. "Nice change of pace from London."

Rose shrugs nonchalantly, turning away and motioning towards the next building on the street, which appears to be a post office.  
"_London_ though, it must be exciting!" she says. "I've only been once, it was pretty, though."

John smiles to himself, thinking of the British Museum with its black siltstone obelisks of Nectanebo II and the Rosetta Stone, the Museum of London with its fragments of the Roman Empire's London Wall, and the Victoria and Albert Museum's examples of Donatello's _rilievo schiacciato_. Weardale and its ridiculously small, semi-perpetually closed museum dedicated to the history of cheap fluorite and lead, featuring side-shows of geneaology and _tapestry weavings_ of all things truly can't even compare. It's nowhere near the same scale, and laughably ridiculous to even consider mentioning it in the same sentence as its betters. And yet … he still finds himself wishing it were open.

He turns away from the building, following Rose down the street.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

There _really_ isn't very much open on the street – the museum is of course closed, the post office is closed, the petrol station is closed, and even the few other vehicles in front of Stout Point are nearly all gone by the time they reach the end of the block.

Rose shrugs, almost embarrassed, and turns around to face John.

"Well, that's it really! Not much more around here," she says, with a hesitant little laugh.

John shakes his head and smiles at her.

"It was nice to see, Rose. Thank you for being my tour guide."

Rose points at one more building, another stone structure aptly named "Stone General Store," and they go inside, the doorbell chiming their arrival as they enter the building. It's a small store, with the wooden-plank floors that seem to be so popular in Weardale, stocked with a multitude of snack foods and groceries on one side of the premises, and hardware supplies on the other side. The front of the store is fully stocked with shovels and rock salt for sale – which is no surprise given the amount of snowfall Weardale seems to get. There is even seems a small area off to the side for camping and fishing supplies, and it makes John smile, as a childhood memory of fishing with his father flickers to his mind.

"Hi Bev!" Rose says in greeting to a middle-aged woman by the front counter, giving her a quick hug. "Just here for the usual stuff. This is my student, John – I've just been showing him around Weardale a bit."

"Hello Rose!" Bev replies fondly. "And it's nice to meet you, John! Oh, Rose - Jimmy was looking for you earlier, he wanted to know if you thought you might need help with that new satellite box. Said he could stop by if you need him to."

"Nah thanks Bev, John here got it sorted for me, but thanks!" Rose says. "I saw Jimmy earlier over at Stout, he didn't say anything about it, though!"

Bev shrugs and Rose grabs a basket, leading John down an aisle towards the refrigerators in the back of the store.

"Two cartons of milk, a dozen eggs … and do you still want bananas pancakes in the morning?" she asks.

John's elated smile is all the response Rose needs, and she laughs, putting the bananas in her basket.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

The next day, John rises early and heads downstairs for breakfast. Once again, it's just him and Wilf at the table, everyone else having already headed out. John feels strangely disappointed that he appears to have missed Rose, as he was hoping to start his lesson early. In the meantime, Wilf once again _insists_ of course on making John banana pancakes, and John is equally as insistent on helping him. The two men share a leisurely breakfast, Wilf regaling John with tales about leaving home to join the Parachute Regiment – "the Paras" – when he was in his teens just after World War II.

As they're finishing their meal, Rose comes in the door, skis and boots perched over her shoulder. She sets them down, grabs a cup of coffee, and joins them at the table, listening to her grandfather's stories with an amused smile on her face. John realizes that she's probably heard these stories a hundred times growing up, but Wilf clearly delights in telling them, and John quite likes listening to them. He'd never gotten to know his own grandfathers, but he likes to think that if he had, that it might have been a little like this – sitting at a table, over a favourite breakfast, listening to well-worn stories over and over again.

After they finish the last of their breakfast, they begin to clear their plates from the table and Rose turns to John with a tentative smile.  
"I was wondering … do you want to try something new today? I know you say you were more interested in downhill skiing, but if you're up for learning a little about cross-country skiing too, I thought we could try that today."

John hesitates only momentarily. He has ten more weekends after this to not make a fool of himself in Chamonix, which is hardly any time at _all _considering the level of skill he's hoping to attain by that point. He's barely learned _anything _about skiing on slopes yet, other than how to fall inelegantly both when he's trying, as well as when he's _not _trying. Ten more weeks may as well be tomorrow if he wastes any time – he has _no _time to practice during the week in London, after all. His weekends up here in Weardale are short and precious, and meant to be fully invested towards Chamonix, but all the same …

"I'd love to," he says, the words flowing from his mouth as naturally as the air from his lungs, and she smiles at him.

After he puts on his brand new skiwear Rose had helped him pick out, she helps him with his equipment, reminding him again to not fasten the wrist-strap on his ski pole because they will _definitely_ be going off-piste today. He notices that the skis and boots she's picked out are slightly different from the ones he wore last week. These new skis are skinnier, and much longer than the ones he'd worn the previous weekend, and the boots attach to the skis only at the toe.

Being a physicist, of _course _he notices another slight difference as well – unlike the smooth, sleek bottom of the downhill skis, the bottom of these skis seem to be imprinted with a tiny fish-scale pattern. His mind runs through the kinetics implications of this, as well as the effect on force and friction, and he mentions his finding to Rose, equations on the tip of his tongue –

"It's for traction," Rose replies simply, with a smile, as they take their first steps outside.

_Ah._

"Cross-country skiing is a lot like walking. Just keep your skis parallel and make sure to not lift up your feet," Rose continues. "And then you just stride forward – like this!"

She demonstrates it for him, and as he attempts his first strides he's happy to note that with this – _this! _– he seems to be quite a natural.

They start down the same path he recognizes from snowmobiling with Rose yesterday, following the tracks in the snow made not just from Rose's snowmobile but from other skiers at the B&B. When they reach a clearing however, she turns, leading him down a new path of completely untrodden snow. It's old snow from last week's snowfall and is crunchy under their feet, a counterpoint to the click-clacking noise from their skis with each stride. It seems to be an old, unused trail by the look of it, and they continue on for some distance, John growing increasingly more comfortable with long strides and cross-balance of his hands and poles. He only wishes that _downhill_ skiing felt this natural to him.

After a while, the trail opens again to another clearing, and Rose slows down, turning away from the trail and seeming to hesitate momentarily. She takes a deep breath and looks at John.

"My dad used to work down at the mine," she says, pointing in the direction of a far-off dilapidated stone structure surrounded by the remnants of other stone buildings. "They shut it down the year I was born. He was trying to invent this pulley system, see, to make it more efficient so it would maybe cost less and the company would leave it open. A lot of people were gonna lose their jobs if it closed. But before he could try it, there was this accident and the mine flooded when they were all inside and ..." she trails off, shrugging a little too casually, gaze focused stonily and resolutely on the rocky crags in the background.

"Anyway," she resumes after a moment. "Gramps never wanted to leave after that. I guess I stay for him. I guess. I dunno. I don't want him to be by himself."

She shrugs. She looks so solitary, so _alone_ in that moment, standing out brightly against the forlorn rocky background in her hot pink ski suit. She drops her eyes and he's struck with an odd and sudden urge to take her hand. He doesn't, of course - it would be highly inappropriate, and plus she is wearing thick ski gloves, but even so...

"I wish I could have met him," he says, surprised that he _means _it, and even more surprised at the almost tender tone that has crept unawares into his voice as he gazes at her.

She smiles at him. It's a gracious smile, a bright smile, and without even giving it another thought it makes him smile too. They stand there for a minute like that, before her eyes drop to the snow, her skis shuffling slightly on the ground.

Suddenly she looks up at him again, a small but mischievous smile on her face.

"C'mon," she says, cocking her head back in the direction of the B&B. "I'll race ya!"


	9. Chapter 9

It's not a _real_ race, of course – John knows that if she were trying, Rose would have beat him as effortlessly as she'd destroyed him in darts the previous night. Instead, it's a friendly, brisk trek side-by-side back to the B&B, filled with banter and discussion about the multiple cross-country trails nearby. She tells him they can explore as many of these trails as he wants together, whenever he'd like, and he finds himself agreeing to it.

He reckons that he's recently found himself agreeing to a _lot_ of things around Rose that wouldn't normally interest him at all – learning about Weardale, for one, and even taking a tour of the town and finding he actually _liked_ it. And now cross-country skiing, which most _certainly_ is also not on his intended list of things to do. After all, it would seem a waste to not learn more about this style of skiing – this part of the country seems quite suited to it, after all – the gentle slopes of the hills and shallow valleys seem almost made for it. And he loves learning new things.

But … brilliant as he is, he doesn't usually let himself get sidetracked from the mission at hand so easily.

He shrugs off the momentary flicker of worry that every weekend spent not practicing his downhill skiing is a wasted opportunity to impress Jeanne during their upcoming trip, suddenly realizing that truly, he has _no_ reason to panic at all. He's brilliant, and he _certainly_ has the ability to learn _both_ downhill _and_ cross-country skiing, doesn't he? Even though he's only been cross-country skiing for a handful of hours now, and hadn't planned on liking it at all, he found that he _does_ quite enjoy it – and he shouldn't deny himself an activity he likes, should he? He doesn't see the harm. Rose certainly has no objection to teaching him both, after all. Perhaps he just ought to relax about it all, and let things happen: Rose certainly hasn't steered him wrong so far, and he finds he's quite enjoying spending time with her and learning from her. He's lucky to have found her, she's truly an excellent instructor.

He glances over at Rose for a long moment, his eyes lingering on the healthy glow on her cheeks that suits her so well, and smiles at her, as she blushes back at him.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

Dinner consists of Wilf's hearty, steaming variation on Black Sheep Ale and Steak Pie. Once again, the other guests are out-of-towners, a family of four, including two quite _active _young boys and their parents, who had come up from Manchester to introduce their children to skiing. The boys, currently wriggling in their seats and fighting over who-gets-to-sit-next-to-mommy, have a lesson scheduled with Rose the next day, which disappoints John slightly, as he was hoping to have her to himself at least for a while before he drove back to London.

After dinner, the family declines Wilf's offer of a drink in the sitting room. Instead, they quickly retire to their room for the night so that the boys can rest up for their 'big day' with Miss Rose, leaving a disastrous table in their wake. Peas are _everywhere_, lined up like little soldiers on the border of the placemats, while several are squashed into the seat, and a few rebels are spotted on the floor as well. Rose gets a broom as Wilf offers John a bottle of the ale he had enjoyed last week.

John feels a bit awkward standing around, ale in hand, watching on the sidelines as Wilf and Rose clean up. He's their guest – their _paying_ guest – but it feels a bit odd to just stand around doing nothing while the people with whom he is conversing are busy chasing rogue peas on the table. He momentarily puts down his ale in order to pick up his own plate and glass off the table, placing them into the kitchen sink, then returns to the dining area.

"Can I … help?" he asks, somewhat lamely.

"Nah, won't take but a minute," Rose says with a small grin. "But thank you."

He nods and grabs his ale again, taking another sip. He _could _retire to the sitting room – a drink in the sitting room was what Wilf had offered him, after all – but it would seem overly rude somehow to walk away without them as they work.

"Want to watch something on the Sky box? We wouldn't have it if it weren't for you," Rose asks as she finishes wiping up the last of the peas from the table.

He sees she's left one straggling pea on the table, hiding behind the centerpiece, and he picks it up, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger. Rose breaks into a grin and takes it from him, dropping it into her napkin.

"You sure you don't need to rest up extra for tomorrow?" he asks, raising an eyebrow questioningly and motioning his head towards the staircase the family had just climbed.

"Nah… kids might make a mess, but they aren't much trouble to teach," she says, biting back a laugh.

Suddenly her expression sobers a little, and she shrugs.

"Not as much as some of the adults, anyway."

He's ready to take this as a jest, a play insult, but there's a frown in her eyes and something tells him that she's serious, and that it's not directed at him. He's set to ask her about it, to find out what kinds of trouble she's had in the past – she's a pretty, young instructor and his eyes narrow slightly, almost protectively, as his mind races across a few potential scenarios he can imagine all too easily – when Wilf comes into the room and asks them if they've decided on what to watch yet.

They let John pick the show, which is well enough by him since – _unbelievably_ – neither Wilf nor Rose has seen his favorite program, about an alien who travels through time and space. Wilf watches the first episode with them amiably enough, then retires to bed a bit early, even for him, John thinks to himself. Rose stays with John, curling up on the opposite end of the sofa and listening – really _listening _, he marvels – as he tells her about plot points and arcs, and repeatedly pauses the second – and third – episodes of show to explain throwbacks to the bygone years of the show from decades before. It's fun for him to rewatch these, to share them with a new viewer, and it's even _more _fun when the viewer seems to have an intrinsic understanding of the feel of the show. He finds Rose is quite good at picking out characterization details, and he smiles at some of the insight she's able to give, even after a single viewing of a handful of episodes.

After the fourth episode, even John can't stifle a yawn.

It's late, and he really should get an early start tomorrow to head back to London to prepare for Monday's classes. He looks over at Rose to say good-night, only to find her eyes closed, her breathing even, with one of her hands tucked under her chin.

Something inside John softens at the sight, alternating with a small feeling of guilt that he may have kept her up too late, and he slowly rises from the sofa, cautious to not awaken her. He crouches next to the end of the sofa, by the same small antique chest Rose had opened last week, and quickly finds what he is looking for.

He carefully tucks the hot pink Snuggie around her, smiles gently, then tiptoes quietly up to bed.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

On Wednesday, Clyde comes to John's office to work on the project John had given them, geophysics research on modeling short-term changes in wind patterns. The boys have worked out a schedule where, depending on their class schedules, one of them comes in every day to download readings from the national weather service's Met Office website, and upload them into a database John has created. It's tedious work, hundreds of readings across dozens of British cities every day, but the resultant analysis will give both Clyde and Luke authorship credits and a publication to their name by the time they graduate, which they will need if either of them decides to pursue advanced education.

This arrangement suits John just fine: his new office is half the size of his old one, but contains just as many books and bits and bobs, shoved into corners and piled high on top of each other. He sets up a computer for the boys in one corner, a small workstation surrounded by a perilously stacked collection of textbooks, and has his own workstation across the small office.

Clyde is hard at work copying down data, and John knows he _should _be hard at work as well.

Instead, he minimizes the window for his grant proposal for additional funding on the project, and opens his web browser to the Cross Country Skier website where he's been spending quite a lot of time this week. He's learned a _fascinating_ amount of information within just the past few days, about a style of skiing he'd been only peripherally aware of before Rose introduced him to it. She'd promised to take him out again if he wanted, and he wonders if perhaps he can split his time between both cross-country _and _downhill. He muses if there's anywhere he might even be able to practice closer to London, then quickly dismisses the thought, as he'd quite like to keep Rose as an instructor.

A sudden knock at the door interrupts his thoughts, and he grins to see Jeanne standing there, the first time he's seen her in more than a week.

"Hello, stranger," she says playfully.

"Jeanne! Hello!" John says with a grin, rising to his feet and nearly knocking over several stacks of papers in the process.

"I feel like I've hardly seen you lately," she says, a small pout forming on her lips. "So I thought I'd visit."

She takes a step into the office and suddenly notices Clyde in the corner, staring up at her with wide eyes, doubtlessly never having seen one professor flirt so openly with another one before.

"Hello," she says, smiling down at him. "I'm Dr. Poisson, French department."

"Clyde," he squeaks out. "Physics student."

She nods politely then turns her attention back to John.

"I do have another reason for stopping by: I came by to ask you if you've booked your flight yet," she says. "I was going to book a flight to Geneva, but there's a one-day deal on British Airways for first-class seating on a flight to the Chambéry-Savoie aéroport."

"Oooh that's brilliant, and no, I hadn't!" John says, turning to face his computer to search for the flight she'd mentioned. He navigates away from the Cross Country Skier website to look up flight prices for British Airways. He's happy to see that the price for this flight is _definitely_ within his budget (_that _would have been embarrassing), and he smiles at her.

"Perfect," she says, coming to stand behind him as he types, something which normally would have annoyed him – he highly values his privacy, after all – but it's _Jeanne_, and he finds he doesn't mind at all. "Perhaps we can share a taxi to the resort?"

"Even more brilliant," he replies, looking up at her fondly over his shoulder.

They don't get a chance to share a moment, no lingering gaze passes between the two of them, before Clyde's voice pops in almost out of nowhere.

"Are you going to a conference?" Clyde asks.

John's head whips around and he begins to stutter out a response, but Jeanne beats him to it, smiling at the boy.

"No, for a weekend ski trip. Even your professors like to get away to have fun sometimes," she tells Clyde with a wink.

Clyde blushes and looks back down at his workstation. John doesn't miss the boy's raised eyebrows. Jeanne apparently doesn't miss it either, laughing quietly.

"I'll book it then," John says after a moment, filling the uncomfortable silence between Jeanne's laughter and the tip-tapping of Clyde's fingers on his keyboard.

"I'm glad," she replies, her gaze soft, and there's a long pause.

He gets the impression she would have said more had they been alone.

He suddenly feels slightly awkward and looks down at his desk – Clyde is still there, after all, no doubt listening with rapt attention to every word they are saying. And no doubt cataloging each word to report back to Luke.

"Don't be a stranger," she says after a moment, giving him a small wave and heading out the door.

He waves back at her, his hand remaining raised and his gaze staying focused on the door for a few moments after she steps out. He feels a pair of eyes on him and looks over at Clyde, whose eyes widen once again before diverting his full attention to intently focus on his work at the computer. John sighs and looks back at the computer. He leaves the British Airways tab open to book his ticket later, but opens another tab on his web browser and once again navigates to the Cross Country Skier site.


	10. Chapter 10

That Friday, John once again sneaks off from work a bit early. It's Luke's turn in the office for data collection, and both he and Clyde have been so hard at work on the project, that John wishes them a nice weekend as he quickly ushers Luke out of his office, and tells the boy he's letting him off early as a reward. The truth, however, is _slightly _different. There's an interdepartmental happy hour at the local pub for one of his colleagues who is getting married, and despite the fact that there's a good chance Jeanne will be there, John wants to get up to the B&B in time for supper - Wilf had promised him a special meal tonight, a local Cumbrian entree called Cumberland sausage that John had never had before. Rose had heartily vouched for it, longingly rubbing her stomach at the mere mention of the dish and saying that her grandfather's recipe was _brilliant -_ and John was more than willing to take her word for this and try it firsthand.

He loads his duffel bag into his car, as well as two new shopping bags from Ski + Rock, having been back to that skiing store twice this week already after reading online about useful skiing gear, and begins his journey back up to Weardale. The drive itself is easier than he expected: he's gotten used to the country roads now, the gentle slope of the land as he heads north, the cloudy sky hanging low over the barren countryside like a soft wool blanket. As he drives further north, it begins to snow, billowy cotton-white flecks lazily drifting down from the sky to carpet the ground. John can't help but think the snow will result in good skiing conditions this weekend: he wonders if Rose will think that the fresh snow will be more suitable for downhill or for cross-country skiing, and smiles, not particularly caring which one he practices this time.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

By the time John arrives, Wilf is already in the kitchen, hard at work on the sausage, and John wastes no time donning an apron and heading into the kitchen himself.

The Cumberland sausage looks _delicious - _it's a long, coiled, homemade sausage that looks vaguely reminiscent of a length of rope wound around itself, and it smells divine, like pork and bacon and nutmeg sizzling together headily on the grill before him. Despite not usually finding the time or the inclination to do anything more than heat up a frozen dinner for himself at home, John presses Wilf for the recipe. Wilf gladly shares this with John, and hands him a bowlful of raw potatoes and a knife to slice them for the meal, while Wilf grabs plates and silverware and heads off to set the table.

It's pleasant, John thinks, as he and Wilf work side-by-side to make the meal - he never had anyone to teach him the particulars of cooking before, he'd always just learned on his own, experimenting with this-and-that in the same way he experimented while making so many of his electronics. His meals - much like his experiments - generally turned out well, which John chocks up to his general brilliance with tinkering. Still, it's nice to truly _learn _from someone, for once. Most of the time he doesn't even bother to cook just for himself, and he can't remember the last time he made something from scratch in his kitchen. But the grandfatherly older man has become quite a friend to John over the past couple of weekends (and has it _really _only been that short a time he's known Rose and Wilf?), and John is more than happy to help out with dinner.

As soon as the sausage and potatoes are finished cooking, the two men head out to the dining area, Wilf leading the way with the sausage balanced on a serving platter. As they reach the table, John notices with a slight amount of surprise that Wilf has only set two places … so not only does this likely mean that no other _guests _will be joining them tonight, but also -

"Isn't Rose coming?" John finds himself asking.

Wilf shakes his head as he sets the sausage down on the table, and John shrugs off a vague disappointment - Rose had seemed to like the dish, after all. It would be a shame for her to miss it.

"Nah, she's up at Swinhope Moor tonight. It was her day teaching there, so it's her job to close up the rental shop - she usually gets home late at night when she teaches, so I just save her a plate."

"Is that safe for her, though?" John asks, slightly alarmed. "At night, with the snow falling like this? I could get my car and -"

Wilf smiles at him then, almost a knowing smile and John finds inexplicably finds himself slightly annoyed, wondering what the older man finds so amusing.

"She's got the snowmobile, she'll be fine."

John nods, not quite convinced, but also not entirely comfortable under Wilf's gaze, and both men dig into their dinner, which tastes even more delicious than it looks. After a few minutes, John asks Wilf more about his tour of duty with the parachute regiment in the 1940s, and Wilf spends the rest of the meal telling John about his postwar duties in British Malaya, the difficulties he faced from the power struggles between Britain's attempted formation of the Malayan Union and the crown colony of Singapore, an untenable balance which eventually crumbled and led to the formation of Malaysia itself. As brilliant as he fancies himself with science, John's education on history during his upbringing had focused more on the glories of the British Empire and not its slow but inevitable decline, be it in the coal and fluorite mines of Northern England or the _Istana Negara _in Kuala Lumpur, and he listens intently to Wilf, enjoying every word of Wilf's story as much as Wilf enjoys telling it.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

Wilf is right, and Rose doesn't arrive as they're seated eating in the dining room, while they're doing the dishes in the kitchen, or when they're seated in the sitting room afterwards - Wilf in his old brown chair, John splayed out on the blue sofa. As Wilf heads to bed, exhausted from talking the night away with John over a few ales, John slowly makes his way upstairs as well to his bedroom.

Well, it's not _his _bedroom, per se, because he's merely a paying guest here, but he's ended up with this same room for both of his prior visits and is beginning to consider it his own, in a way. He wonders if Wilf and Rose think of it this way as well, and if that's why they keep giving him the same room, then quickly dismisses the notion - he's merely a guest, one of many they have on a weekly basis. They probably don't spare it a thought at all.

John undresses quickly and steps into the shower … as usual, it feels delightful. He slips on his pajamas and crawls under the covers of his - well, _the - _bed, grabbing his computer, intent on getting a little bit of work done before turning in for the night. He stifles a yawn and begins reviewing the data set that Luke and Clyde have been populating - which in turn causes him to stifle two more yawns, frightfully boring as the topic of differentials in weather patterns is.

Soon, in the distance, he hears the rumbling of a motor, and sees the reflection off his wall of two tiny beams of light, clearly from a set of headlights far too small to be from a car. The rumbling gets closer and closer, then stops completely when it sounds as if it's just below his window.

With one last yawn, John closes his computer and clicks his bedside light off, soon falling to sleep.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

The next morning, John heads downstairs to breakfast to find Rose setting the table. Smiling to himself, he comes to stand beside her, taking a pile of forks on the table and helping to set each one by the plates as Rose sets them, and after a brief greeting, they fall into companionable silence. After a leisurely meal (and John cannot _believe _Rose had never tried banana pancakes before!), they head to the front foyer together as Wilf clears the table.

"I think the new powder will be excellent for downhill skiing today. I thought we'd take the snowmobile up to Swinhope Moor," she says. "That will get you some downhill skiing practice today."

John nods … no cross-country this weekend, he supposes, and though he _shouldn't _feel any disappointment about it, he feels the smallest twinge of regret. Silly, really … he should be practicing for Chamonix.

"We can go to the rental shop first and get your boots - " she adds.

With this statement, John smiles and motions to Rose to hold on a minute - effectively interrupting her - and jogs upstairs. He returns a moment later with a huge smile on his face, and holds out one of the Ski + Rock bags he'd brought with him from London.

"No need! I bought my own boots this week!"

Rose looks over at him, and then at the bag, in surprise, and her face breaks out into a small smile.

"Well let's see them, then!"

He opens the bag and proudly shows her his purchases. He knows he probably should have mentioned his plan to buy them to her - she'd been so much help choosing his ski clothes, after all, and he values her input - but he'd been reading all about ski brands in both _SKI_ magazine as well as the Cross Country Skier website, and there had been a sale at Ski + Rock and … he sighs. Try as he might to save money for Chamonix, there is a reason the amount in his bank account has never been reflective of his salary, and he supposes his tendency for impulse purchases (be they electronics or ski-gear, in this case) has quite a lot to do with that. _Oh well_, he thinks, _nothing to be done for it._

Rose inspects the boots appreciatively.

"Nice choice … they fit well?"

"Oh yes," he says. "Made sure the staff fit them as well as you fit the rentals my first weekend here. You've already spoiled me, Rose Tyler,  
and I'll only take the best."

She looks up at him warmly and he smiles back down at her.

"I bought goggles too!" he says, excitedly reaching into the bag. "Amber-tinted ones. I went for mid-tone amber because I wasn't sure if it would be all blue skies this weekend or overcast, and well, amber's an all-around good color for a lens anyway so -"

He interrupts his monologue, noticing that Rose is smiling softly up at him.

"Did you know that from physics? Studying light and all?" she asks.

He gazes at her momentarily … he _could _say yes, spare himself the embarrassment of letting her know that even as a beginner who's only been at this for three weeks, he's spent most of his spare time recently guzzling down the particulars of ski magazines. Or he could tell her the truth, and hope she doesn't find it so amusing that her gangly-limbed student who could barely stay upright during their last downhill skiing session would be becoming so invested in an activity he's hardly any good at … let alone _why _he's chosen this activity in the first place - and there's even _more_ embarrassment with that tangent. He's not sure he likes either of those choices.

So instead, he shrugs, removing the price tag with his teeth before putting on the goggles and pulling a pose, modeling them for her.

"What do you think? Dashing, isn't it?"

She laughs, and he gives her a little wink.

Rose grabs her skis and holds the door open for him as they head outside, making her way to the snowmobile. She crouches down onto the snow with her skis and pulls what looks like a bungee cord from her pocket, winding it around the base of the ski and looping it under the seat of the snowmobile and back again, securing it onto the machine.

"Are you sure? They could go flying off," he says warily as she fastens them to the machine, one ski on each side, each one pointing backwards and slightly uptilted as if they were low-lying wings on the snowmobile.

She shrugs.

"Works well enough. It's the only way to ride this thing if I want to bring my skis. If they fell off I could just pop off and go get them," she says with a smile.

The angle with which her skis are fastened to the snowmobile makes it impossible for him to fit his feet as far back as he did the last time they rode together, nor put anything resembling space between them. Instead, he finds himself needing to scootch forward closer to her, pressing his torso firmly against her back and bracing his thighs solidly under her own in order to keep his balance.

She starts the machine, and almost immediately they are headed off, albeit in a different direction than the one they took to visit the town of Weardale. This time, Rose comes round the back of the B&B and veers off to a separate point entirely. They're headed down a gentle slope now, nearly treeless except for a few stark, leafless trees standing like sentries, their branches dark and sharp like iron rods pointing up out of the snow.

Soon they're cutting upwards again, the area noticeably more hilly than the almost plateau-like area Rose had taken him cross-country skiing last weekend. In the distance, John can see several more snow-coated hills, and skiers in the distance, coasting towards the bottom of each one. He notices with a smile that there are even two odd-looking ski lifts - they look nothing like the sleek aerial chairs and gondolas from his magazines or the Chamonix brochures, with seated skiers ready to stand up and hop off the lift at the top of the hill to race back down. No, instead _these _ski_-_lifts leave the skier standing on the hill, holding onto a T-shaped pulley to pull them back up to where they started. Rose momentarily idles the snowmobile, and looks back at John.

She follows his gaze and smiles, pointing to the lifts. "They're called draglifts - they literally pull you back up the hill!"

Continuing on their journey, they ascend one more hill and John catches sight of a collection of wood cabins buildings clustered around a larger wood building and nods to himself, noticing the sign for _Swinhope Lodge_, his original hotel destination. Not for the first time, he's glad he ended up at the B&B instead - who knows if he would have gotten to know Rose and Wilf better if his first trip to Weardale had gone as planned.

As they continue past the cabins, John sees one more small, wooden building, at the top of must be more than a 100-metre drop. Several skiers are congregated outside, some apparently readying their skis and poles for a descent on the hill, others merely standing around in their ski boots socializing with each other and drinking cupfulls of something warm enough to steam into the air around their faces, with their skis propped up casually against a nearby guardrail. The sign outside announces _Swinhope Moor - Ski Weardale!, _and as their snowmobile slowly pulls to a stop to the side of the building, several of the skiers turn to Rose and wave.

Rose dismounts from the snowmobile, waves back in greeting, and walks over to a small kiosk set up right outside the building. John recognizes the bloke at the kiosk - Mickey, wasn't it? - and gives him a cheery little wave. Mickey in turn looks from Rose to John then back towards Rose with what can only be described as a little smirk. As Mickey reaches under the counter for the ski passes to give Rose, he says something to her - and though John can't hear what Mickey said, Rose's reaction is to reach over across the kiosk and give Mickey an almost-not-playful swat on the arm as he chuckles irreverently under her glare.

"What was all that about?" John asks her, when she returns moments later with the ski passes and a pair of rental skis for John.

Rose opens and shuts her mouth, as if there were something she were about to say but had thought the better of it. She looks away awkwardly with a slight blush creeping up her cheeks.

"Oh … Mickey? Just being an arse," she says with a slightly forced giggle.

She hands him his ski pass, a sticker for him to affix to his jacket, and quickly leads him over to a nearby wooden bench to put on his skis, effectively ending the conversation. She then walks back to the snowmobile to begin the - what appears to John, at least - somewhat arduous task of untwining her own skis from the snowmobile to free them.

A moment later, she takes a seat beside him at the bench, and as he smiles over at her he notices someone looking at them (and _what is it _with Weardale and feeling like people are staring at him, he wonders). He tosses a glance over his shoulder to find Mickey smiling at them with an overly large grin pasted onto his face. Rose notices this, sighs and shakes her head.

"Alright, c'mon!" she says, turning her back to Mickey.

She comes to a stand and holds out her hands for John - he takes them and she helps to hoist him upright. "We've got a lesson!"

She flashes him a grin and skis a bit ahead of him. As he pulls down his goggles, he notices out of the corner of his eye that Mickey is giving him a thumbs-up. As John waves back and turns around, he doesn't notice Mickey shake his head and start to laugh, gazing after them.


	11. Chapter 11

I just wanted to say thank you to the lovely people who have been taking the time to review this! I'm really not quite sure about what people think about this fic, or if readers care about it/like it/whatever, so any and all feedback is appreciated, review, PM, etc. Thank you! Thanks to fadewithfury(foxmoon) for the beta!

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

It never ceases to amaze him how quickly time passes during his lessons. They're out on the hill for over an hour, the cold air biting against the apples of his cheeks in a way that would surely have driven him indoors any other time back home in London, and it doesn't matter how many times he falls, or the inexplicable fact that he somehow manages to get snow _inside _his new goggles - he hasn't laughed this much in longer than he can remember. He's finding he loves to make _her _laugh as well - each time he flails his arms ineffectively to try to avoid yet another tumble, her laugh resonates all around them, seeming to warm the very air … and it makes _him _smile, too. All the other skiers are so focused on their speed, their techniques, and their tricks, and he and Rose seem to be the only people having this much _fun _on the slope - which somehow makes the entire experience even more hilarious in John's view.

As they finally make it to the bottom of the hill, they trudge over to the "drag-lift" Rose had described during their ride over, which would bring them back to the top of the hill for another go. It's an oddly-shaped piece of equipment, and looks like a large, metal upside-down T, attached to a long pulley that goes from the bottom to the top of the hill. _Hardly_ an engineering marvel, really, he thinks, and the design itself looks simple enough to his eyes. As Rose comes to stand on one side of it, grabbing a hold of the central column and straddling one side of the T, he follows her lead, looping his own leg over the opposite side.

"Now whatever you do," Rose instructs, "Don't -"

… as she speaks, he sits down on the contraption, resting all his weight against it and they immediately go tumbling together to the ground.

It's funny at first, like any other one of the falls he's taken all day, and they lay sprawled in a pile, her shoulders shaking with laughter, their skis and legs intermingled, snow somehow stuffed down the back of his jacket, and _everyone _staring at them.

He stands up first as Rose still roils with laughter on the hard-packed snow ground, having gotten enough practice today falling and standing and falling again to have become rather comfortable with the procedure. Ever the gentleman, he holds out his hand to help her up as well. Smiling, she takes his offered hand, her glove gripping his own as he pulls her up - but as soon as she's semi-upright she gasps, a sharp and pained intake of breath that he's never heard her make before. Her smile fades into a grimace as she clutches his arm for support, both of his own arms instinctively locking around her waist to hold her up.

"Ouch," she says, biting her lip with a wince. "Sorry … it's just my knee."

He's immediately concerned, remembering last week when she'd mentioned a knee injury that had stopped her budding ski career, and his mind races, wondering what he should _do_. They're still at the bottom of the hill, coated thick and deep with last night's snowfall, and he can't see a way to easily get her up to the lodge.

"I'm, oh god, I'm so sorry … Um, are you hurt badly?" he asks, guilt etched onto each word - this is _his _fault, and he knows it, even if he knows by now there's no way she will blame him for it.

She shakes her head in a silent no and gives him a reassuring little grin, which only makes him feel marginally better, and she keeps a firm hold on his arm for support with one hand as she rubs her leg with the other. His arm instinctively moves tighter around her waist, drawing her closer against himself as he peers around, from left to right, his stomach quickening with guilt at the knowledge that he's unintentionally done something colossally stupid and hurt her. He not only _needs_ to fix this, to make sure she's alright - he _wants_ to. He's about to ask one of the passing skiers for help when he hears a male voice, gentle and low, right behind them.

"It's OK, I've got you," the young man says softly, roping his arm around Rose's waist, and John's arm falls away.

"We were just -" John starts to explain, not quite knowing _why _he's trying to explain anything at all.

"Yeah. I saw you."

John's happy for the help of course, he only wants to bring Rose to safety and ensure she's not too badly injured, but there's something unspoken lurking in the young man's clipped tone to which he can't help taking offense. The young man helps Rose to the ground as gently as possible, unfastening her skis with care before sitting back and looking into her face, concern obvious on his own.

"Thanks, Jimmy," Rose says with a grateful smile, and Jimmy smiles back at her. "Just a little twist, I think. Nothing too bad."

"Think you can put weight on it?" Jimmy asks, looking intently at her.

She nods and Jimmy takes her hands in his own, slowly easing her up to her feet in a practiced motion. It takes Rose a moment, but she's able to put some weight on her knee, much to John's relief. Jimmy smiles at her, but her first look is towards John, as if to reassure him that she'll be fine.

"Let's head up," Jimmy says, securing his arm once again around her waist.

Just as Jimmy starts to turn away towards the slope, his arm still looped around Rose like it's the most natural thing in the world - and _completely_ ignoring John's presence - John finds his voice breaking through the crisp morning air, almost despite himself, shattering the silence as if it were a pane of glass.

"Can I help?" he asks.

To John, his own question feels strange, like it's an unwanted interjection where instead he should naturally have a role - he's been out here all morning with Rose, after all, and _of course_ he's bloody well concerned for her welfare. He hates just _standing_ there, wanting to assist Rose - _wonderful_ Rose, who's been nothing but lovely and thoughtful to him these past few weeks. But instead, while she's hurting, he's relegated to doing nothing but holding onto his ski poles ineffectively as the snow in his jacket melts uncomfortably against his neck, and although his words are an attempt to stem the awkwardness, they seem to only pile on further discomfort, judging by the look this offer gets from Jimmy.

"I think you've done enough," Jimmy says.

Something icy settles in John's stomach with those words, but Rose's head snaps up before he can react.

"Hey now, it _wasn't_ his fault. If anything it was mine, I didn't tell-" her face contorts in a momentary grimace as she comes to a full standing position, and John instinctively takes a protective step towards her.

"- I didn't warn him about the lift," she finishes.

"Fine. Carry her skis then."

Jimmy doesn't spare a glance for John over his shoulder as he begins to trudge back up the hill, Rose leaning against him for support. She stops and tosses a glance back over her shoulder at John, trying to hide her slight wince and failing badly.

"You ok, John?" she asks, managing a small grin.

John nods back at her, a tight smile on his face. He notices Jimmy looking at him then as well, the chill in his gaze rivaling that of the air, and John ignores it, flicking his eyes back to Rose. He can't quite explain the whim that comes over him, but he flashes her his most brilliant grin, the one that's had her laughing and smiling brightly back at him all morning long, and nods at her, throwing in a little wink for good measure. She relaxes, smiling widely back at him, and as Jimmy turns away again to lead Rose back up the hill, John stands watching them for a long moment, before gathering Rose's skis and trudging back up the hill behind them.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

Jimmy may be a complete arse, in John's opinion, but he nonetheless is painstakingly careful as he navigates his way up the slope with Rose until they reach the top, letting her lean on him and taking as many breaks on the way up as she needs. As soon as they enter the lodge, Jimmy settles Rose down onto a sofa in the back office, his hands lingering _quite_ unnecessarily over her knee to massage out any residual pain, and John inwardly rolls his eyes at the fact that this rude young man is so obviously _desperate _for Rose's attention. He's not sure why that grates on him as much as it does.

John supposes that some young women might find this kind of bloke handsome - dark, wavy hair running a bit long (and quite _shaggy_), piercing blue eyes - but he's far too young, and far too _surly _for any of that to matter. He hope that Rose - for her own sake - can see that, too. She's kind and well … she's _attractive_ … and clearly, she can do far better.

After a minute, Jimmy gives Rose's hand a little squeeze.

"I should get back to teaching my students - can't leave 'em alone for too long out there, or those kids'll start throwing snowballs at all the skiers again just for fun. Will you be ok for a bit?"

Rose nods.

"Thanks, mate," she says, leaning in to give Jimmy a quick, friendly hug as he leaves the lodge, not even sparing a glance for John on his way out the door.

As soon as they're alone, Rose sighs and leans back against the sofa, resigned, taking off her gloves. She's worrying at her lower lip like something is bothering her, and John's stomach churns at the idea that it could be _him. _He's not quite sure why that bothers him, why the thought that – maybe – she's upset with him makes him feel like he just swallowed a piece of lead. He stands mutely off to the side and simply watches her, his face a mask, until she finally opens her mouth to speak.

"I'm sorry … I think I'm probably out of commission for the rest of the day," she says sadly. "I could set you up with someone else today, I'm really sorry -"

"I wouldn't dream of it," he interrupts softly, yet urgently, and her eyes flick up towards his. "And _I'm _the one who should be saying I'm sorry."

The smile fades off her face and she shakes her head, looking back down at her gloves.

"Don't be. It _was _my fault, I should have told you before we got on the lift, it's not like you've ever used one before … and besides, it's not the first time I've twisted it. My tendons aren't strong in that knee anymore, it happens every so often," she says with a self-deprecating little shrug.

He looks back at her for a long, silent moment and finally nods solemnly, his gaze then breaking from her own.

There are not many other places to sit in the office, and it's clear to him they're going to be here for quite a while, so John leans against a nearby desk instead, removing his hat, jacket and gloves, and tossing them into an unceremonious little pile on the floor. Rose looks at up him and smiles, gently maneuvering herself so as to leave a bit more space on the other side of the sofa, and motions for him to sit down. He takes a seat, plopping himself down on the opposite end of the sofa from her.

"I'm sorry your lesson got cut short," she says. "It'll be free today, of course."

He shrugs, looking over at her with a genuine smile.

"Please, don't bother, it's alright," he says. "I'm just glad you're OK."

"Do you want to go back to the B&B?" she asks hesitantly, smiling back at him. "I need to rest a bit, but I could get someone to give you a lift in the meantime."

He shakes his head and settles in further down into his seat on the sofa, looking around the small room. Besides the sofa, the desk, and a chair, the space is hardly furnished at all except for a bulletin board advertising various services, equipment suppliers, and even a few local events.

"I'll make it up to you," she says after a moment, following his gaze to the flyers covering the wall, and points at the one in the middle. "That ice sculpting festival, three weekends from now - my treat, since you don't want your money back for today. They have ice chess where you actually _are_ the pieces on the board, and a graffiti wall where you can carve anything you want – and it's always a lot of fun - whaddaya say?"

"Rose, you don't need to -"

"I _want_ to," she insists, giving him a playful smack on the arm.

He rubs his arm in a mock display of pain, and grumbles about how there are now _two_ injured parties today, then notices that she looks a little uncertain, her smile fading slightly - it's only then he realizes that he hadn't yet answered her question.

"I'd love to - that'd be _brilliant_," he says, giving her a warm smile.

Her smile broadens, and her gaze lingers on him for a moment. He swallows and looks away momentarily, beginning to feel a little restless. Suddenly, he reaches into his jacket pocket, brandishing a deck of cards, and holds them up for her to see, with a sly grin.

"You keep a deck of cards in your jacket?" she laughs.

"Oh Rose Tyler, I keep _everything _in my jacket!"

She laughs, and he winks, and they begin to play.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

She beats him in poker _eight _times before she feels well enough to ride back to the B&B.

She'd called ahead to Wilf, of course, to let him know she'd be delayed, and although he had seemed very concerned on the phone, by the time they get back he simply gives his granddaughter a big hug and a soft smile, with a gaze that looks almost sad. Wilf makes her promise they'll talk _later _about her injury, which John takes to mean that it will be a private discussion, and Rose gives a long sigh in response.

After dinner, John helps her up the stairs to her room, his arm around her waist, and hers wrapped tightly around his as well. He brings her to her doorway and smiles at her.

"I'm glad you're ok," he says, as she thanks him for his help.

He leans in to give her a little hug then - it's brief, and completely spur of the moment, but it feels natural, especially considering how much time he's spent already with his arm around her for the past few minutes as he helped her up the stairs. Her arms come up to enfold him briefly as well, and after a quick squeeze, they part.

"Goodnight, Rose," he says, giving her one last grin as he heads back down the hall.

"Gnite John," she responds, and before entering her own room, she stares after him just a moment longer, giving him a little wave and smile as he turns to enter his room.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o

Just before bed, he pulls out his laptop one more time and checks his email. He yawns as he scrolls past faculty announcements and emails from students, but stops, smiling to himself when he sees an email from Jeanne. He opens it, and his smile widens. It's an invitation for both him and a few other faculty members to attend an art exhibition at The Natural History Museum in a few weeks' time. But, then he sees that the actual _day _for this is on a Saturday … one of his Weardale Saturdays, as he's coming to think of them. More specifically, and if his memory is correct (which it _always_ is), it's the same day as the ice festival Rose had promised to take him to.

He stares at the screen for a moment, almost pensive, and then begins to type his reply to Jeanne.


	12. Chapter 12

_Thank you so much for all of the reviews - feedback is SO appreciated! My notifications apparently broke however so I'm sorry for the delay in responding!_

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

He looks long and hard at the response he's written, at the single word - "sure" - staring back at him in stark black and white, the cursor blinking back uncertainly at him on the screen. This is _Jeanne_ of all people asking him to the event - and he _wants _to go with her, of course he does, there's no question in his mind about that. He barely sees her at work anymore, and it's brilliant that she thought to invite him - that she _wants_ him there with her. And his entire focus these past few weeks has been invested in skiing in order to bring him closer to her, after all, hasn't it? Oh, he's made a few detours into cross-country skiing and snowmobiling and local tourism of course, but still - he's only here because of her, isn't he? And judging by the time-stamp on the message, _technically _she even asked before Rose asked him, so really, it would be quite rude of him to say no. And although something inside him twists slightly at the thought of canceling his plan with Rose … surely Rose wouldn't care _that _much, would she? She even said herself that she was inviting him as compensation for the missed lesson, after all - Rose was simply trying to do him a favor by inviting him to the ice festival in the first place.

He pauses for a moment, wonders what he's waiting for, then finally clicks send, sighing heavily. It takes a while for the email to go through, and he wonders if perhaps he should have written something longer, or more enthusiastic, if Jeanne might read something into this that he didn't intend. His response to her email about Chamonix after all had been almost embarrassing in its wordiness and emoticons, he'd been as giddy as a child to receive her invitation. This is _Jeanne_ after all, and he wants to spend time with her, he really does, but ...

He frowns slightly, thinking of the uncertainty in Rose's eyes when he didn't respond right away to her offer, of how enthusiastic she seemed about the ice festival, how much she clearly thought he'd like it. He hopes she doesn't mind … after all, this is more _him_ losing out on going to the ice festival than anything else. He certainly doesn't want to presume that the excitement in her eyes when she spoke of the festival had anything to do with the fact that he'd agreed to go with her. She made it seem like she goes quite often, after all … she enjoys it, she'd go and have a wonderful time whether or not he's there.

Right then. It's settled. He'll tell Rose tomorrow.

He clicks off his bedside light and goes to sleep.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

The next morning, John awakens to sunlight streaming in through his window and pouring itself comfortably across his bed like a warm winter quilt. Although he'd be normally content to rouse slowly from this little cocoon, his first thought is to go find Rose, and he stretches himself awake, wondering if her knee is feeling better today, and hoping that she doesn't have to cancel any additional ski lessons today on his behalf. After a quick shower made all the more brief because he wants to check on her, he packs up his duffel bag and ski gear, and heads downstairs. As soon as he arrives in the lobby, he looks around for Rose, but she's nowhere in sight - a common enough occurrence here at the B&B, but still a disappointment. Walking to the frost-covered window, he gently opens the rustic curtains, and notices the snowmobile is gone from its usual spot. He feels a small wave of relief wash over him - it's _good_ that she's feeling well enough to head out this morning, that his blunder yesterday didn't cause her any real damage.

John finds Wilf in the kitchen making a traditional Durham County breakfast called 'bacon floddies', and John dons an apron as is quickly becoming his custom here and steps in to help. Side by side, they grate potatoes and stir eggs and chop up bacon, making them into small patties as Wilf gives John an impromptu lesson on how hot to heat the stove and how to shake the old iron griddle over the heat so that the eggs don't stick to the bottom. The griddle is heavy in John's hand, and the wrought iron handle feels rough against his fingers - it's clearly an ancient contraption, and John smiles to himself, at the thought of something so old and rugged lasting generations and still being of good use in this day and age.

"Rose is feeling better, I take it?" John asks as the floddies sizzle in front of him, filling the air with the aroma of bacon and eggs and warmth.

Wilf moves past John to head over towards the sink, his only response a small shrug, and it strikes John that this is the only time he's seen Wilf fall silent on a topic of interest to him.

"She always does after a good night's rest," Wilf finally says, his tone casual, and at odds with the vigor with which he is suddenly scrubbing the dishes. "Still, I told her she should cancel her lesson this afternoon, not that she listened."

A small wave of guilt washes over John, and he puts down the griddle, turning to face his new … well, his new _friend_, as he's honestly starting to consider Wilf. He's not sure of what to say, not sure if Wilf blames him for Rose's injury on the slopes yesterday. Despite Rose's words to the contrary, John still blames himself … and the thought suddenly strikes him that perhaps _that's_ the reason Jimmy's words so instinctively rubbed him the wrong way - that perhaps the young man saw in John exactly what John thought of himself.

"I'm so sorry, Wilf," John says quietly, "Yesterday was all my fault. I never meant to -"

Wilf shakes his head, interrupting him.

"No, it's not your fault. It's the second time she's twisted it this season," Wilf says quietly. "Her doctor promises she's fine, but she's only twenty… And she's already pushed her body so far. I just worry…"

Wilf breaks off his statement, sighing again. John stands still, silently watching Wilf, somehow instinctively knowing that the older man had more he wanted to say. After a moment, Wilf shuts off the faucet and dries his hands, then looks over at John to meet his eyes.

"She told me you said you'd put in a good word for her. To get into a university."

John stares at Wilf for a moment, a bit surprised - of course he remembers the conversation with Rose clearly from last week. Still, he hadn't really considered it was something she might actually want to _do _- he'd just hated the thought of her limiting herself, and thinking that she _couldn't_ do something. It's amazing how much she's been able to build herself a life without money, a family, or university, all by the age of 20 - _she's_ brilliant, and any university would be lucky to have her. He'd meant every word he'd said about her being able to take on the world, and of course he'd help her apply. He wants to, and she deserves a chance - there's no question in his mind about it at all.

"I will - if that's what she wants," John says.

Wilf doesn't speak any words in reply, but rather stares at John a moment longer, a small, almost relieved smile creeping onto his face. He then nods his head decisively and looks thoughtfully off into the distance as he grabs a dish towel and begins to dry the dishes.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

Rose joins them at the tail end of breakfast, interrupting what had been a very vigorous debate about the merits of cooking with ceramic vs. cast iron pans. The two men sit at the table, their breakfast and coffee all but abandoned, so engrossed in their conversation that her presence isn't noticed by either of them until she walks up to pour herself a cup of tea. She plops herself down in the high-backed, wooden chair with ease, drawing her knees up casually and sitting with her legs criss-crossed in the chair. John smiles to himself as he notices the grace and ease with which Rose is moving - she's clearly feeling much better than she was yesterday.

"Food doesn't taste as good unless it browns properly, and the heat distribution is best with cast iron!"

"I'm not saying _you _should use ceramic, Wilf, they're just so much greener!"

"Rose! What do _you_ think?" Wilf says, and both men turn around to face her, expectant.

"I think…" she hesitates, looking from one to the other from behind her cup of tea. "I think — oooh you made floddies! … but … Oi! You didn't save any for me!" she says in mock annoyance, glaring at the empty platter.

Without missing a beat, John slides his plate over to her, where a single floddie remains intact and undisturbed off to the side, then resumes his vigorous defense of the merits of ceramic. She smiles at him, a slow, almost bashful smile, and he gives her a wink and turns back to Wilf, expounding on the ease of dishwashing as she picks up the floddie and chews it thoughtfully.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

The debate exhausts itself soon thereafter, and Wilf insists on clearing the plates from the table himself so that John can finish his coffee. Rose stays seated at the table as well, nursing a cup of tea, as they sit in companionable silence, the distant clank of the dishes and running water in the kitchen being the only sound. John downs the last of his now tepid coffee with a gulp then turns in his chair to face Rose, his eyes meeting hers.

"You're feeling better?" he asks softly.

She nods and smiles at him, and he smiles back, relief easing away the remaining guilt he felt over their mishap.

"Much better, thanks," she says. "Are you … are you going to leave this morning? I know you usually leave early, but I … I just didn't know if you wanted to make up your lesson today -"

He shakes his head and notices that her face falls slightly.

"You should rest," he says.

"I'm _fine _-"

"Rose," he says, her name rolling slowly off his tongue as he leans forward towards her, meeting and holding her gaze. "Rest. _Please_ promise me you'll rest. Just for today."

She pauses for a moment, staring back at him, her eyes seeming to search his, then takes a deep breath and nods. Her eyes drop from his then to linger on the table, as if she's lost in thought, and it strikes him that there's something almost forlorn about her expression. Somehow, almost instinctively, he feels an urge to comfort her, and he leans towards her, smiling at her. He feels her squeeze his hand, and it's only then, with a small jolt, that he realizes that his hand had come to rest on hers, seemingly of its own volition, and that his fingers were in the process of squeezing hers back.

He clears his throat and slips his hand from hers awkwardly. He rises from the table then, his gaze falling on his multiple bags by the door. His duffel bag sits alongside the Snow + Rock shopping backs, his new ski gear stuffed haphazardly back inside the latter, as he'd long since given up trying to fit it in as neatly as it fit when he bought it.

"I suppose I should get going," he says, motioning to his bags.

Rose nods, rising slowly from the table to head over to the registration desk. She glances at his luggage, in particular at the myriad of gear poking out from the shopping bags, and her eyes flick up to meet his.

"If you don't need your ski gear back in London … you can leave it here," she says, her eyes a bit hesitant. "If you want."

"Is that OK - I mean, wouldn't you need the room for guests during the week?" he asks.

She shakes her head quickly, the silky strands of her blond hair dancing with the motion, as she ducks her head to look back down at John's checkout paperwork on the registration desk.

"No, most of our guests are weekend stays, and, well, that's pretty much your room now for as long as you come up here, so I just thought that maybe -"

"That'd be lovely," he says softly, with a smile in his eyes, and as soon as he speaks, she looks back up at him, smiling as well.

After a moment, her eyes break from his own, and she leans over the desk to hand him his receipt.

"I'll see you next week then?" she says, stuffing her hands in her pockets and coming out to the front of the registration desk.

He gives her a bright grin.

"Absolutely."

She smiles then, a wide smile that makes her pretty brown eyes crinkle at the sides, and takes a step forward, giving him a quick hug before stepping away. He hugs her back with an affectionate squeeze and smiles to himself. He's relieved now - he's glad that she feels better, than she'll rest today - that he didn't really hurt her. He runs back up to his room to drop off the bags, then heads downstairs again to hand her the room key.

"Keep it," she says, shaking her head and laughing. "All your stuff is in there!"

He gives her one last grin, then shoves his duffel bag into the passenger seat of his car and climbs inside, ready to start the long trek back to London. She stands in the doorway and he waves to her as he starts the ignition - _well_, as he _tries_ to start the ignition, at any rate. He pretends to not notice her surprised giggle as he removes the mallet from underneath his seat to give the clutch a good whack to get it in motion. With one final wave to her, he eases his car out of the driveway and back onto the main road, and Rose finally slips out of his sight in his rearview mirror.

He travels several uneventful kilometers, humming to himself, and is nearly to the A1 before he realizes that he forgot to tell Rose he wouldn't be going to the festival.


	13. Chapter 13

_A/N Thank you so much for the kind reviews - feedback is much appreciated! And as always thank you to fadewithfury/foxmoon for the beta!_

0-0-0-0-0-0

"So," Jack says. "How are your lessons going?"

"Fine." John takes a long swig of his ale and nods for emphasis. He spins the slightly damp paper coaster around on the counter-top with the tip of his finger, stopping only as it begins to tear under the friction of the motion.

They sit at the bar in the little-known off-campus pub they often frequented while at uni together. It's the first time they've seen each other in the near-month since John started his lessons, and John normally looks forward to these outings with Jack, and to their easy, cavalier conversations. Tonight however, he finds that skiing is the last thing he wants to discuss - which is particularly unfortunate, as this seems to be the main topic of interest to Jack.

"Just fine? Come on, you were over the moon about Chamonix. Is it too difficult?" Jack asks.

"No, not too difficult," John says. He can't blame Jack for pressing the topic. Last time they had spoken, _weeks_ ago, John was eager to get started – an update was of course to be expected.

Jack's still the only one who actually knows for a fact that John is taking lessons - John wonders however if Clyde and Luke might know, thanks to a receipt from Swinhope Moor for his lessons with Rose he'd accidentally left mixed in with the data he'd brought back from Weardale last week. His plan had been to keep the entire excursion secret lest Jeanne of all people find out, but now …

"What have you learned?"

John shrugs, noncommittal, and leans forward to rest his elbows on the shiny mahogany of the counter, staring into the frothy amber of his ale.

"This and that. Bit of downhill, bit of cross-country. Rose is a good teacher."

"… _Rose?_" Jack says, with a chuckle, sipping his drink and giving John a sidelong glance.

From anyone else, this would have sounded like an innocent confirmation of interest, and quite polite, even - John wouldn't have even thought twice about it. But John knows his friend too well - there's something about Jack's slight eyebrow raise and the smirk in his voice that suddenly and inexplicably causes John's jaw to clench.

"That's her name - do you suggest I call her something else?"

He means to sound casual, almost flippant, but even to his own ears it's a quite a bit snippier than he intended.

"Whoa, easy there. Just teasing you."

John opens his mouth as if to respond, and whether it will come out as a warning or an apology he's not sure, but instead he merely sighs. He feels Jack's eyes on him, curious and maybe slightly concerned, but doesn't turn around to meet his glance. Instead, he turns back to his beverage and draws a long swig of the remainder to avoid further questions.

Not that Jack's questions are really the problem - John knows better, even after several ales. The truth is, he wishes he had simply been able to _tell_ Rose that he couldn't go to the ice festival with her. It has been lingering on his mind all week, much more than he was expecting it to. It's ridiculous, really, how much he's been thinking about this, and he doubts _she'll _even care that he can't go. He momentarily wonders if he should call her, and then quickly dismisses the thought - he doesn't want to make a thing of it, and surely it's not a big enough deal for her that it can't wait until he sees her next. He's not quite sure why it bothers him so much - _wellll_, that's not exactly true, and it compounds his frustration that he's clearly even attempting to be disingenuous with himself inside his own head. She's been marvelous, and incredibly kind to him. She's become a friend to him - one of the few he feels like he has - and he dislikes feeling like he's somehow doing _wrong _by her, or being dishonest with her. And the more he thinks about it, the more he realizes that he _has_ been, hasn't he, in a way? Surely the reasons he's taking lessons at all are his own private business, but as both his new friend and his teacher, perhaps Rose ought to know, shouldn't she? He was initially embarrassed about admitting his reasons for his lessons, but now that they know each other better, would it really be so bad to tell her about everything, really, about Chamonix, about Jeanne -

The thought causes an inexplicable twist of tension in John's stomach. If he tells Rose he has to cancel his plans with her because of Jeanne, this would naturally lead to a conversation about Jeanne and Chamonix. Rose would obviously understand if he told her about Jeanne, wouldn't she? She's been so empathetic – _would_ she understand? Or maybe she wouldn't – maybe she'd be upset that he hadn't told her before. Not that there's a _reason _for her to get upset, they've only just become friends. But Chamonix – and Jeanne – is what all of their lessons together are based on, isn't it? So it would certainly make things simpler if he could explain _why_ he's been taking lessons – he wouldn't have to hide that fact – not that he's been _hiding _it exactly, merely withholding it. But would she see it that way? He looks down at the counter, at the remnants of his paper coaster now torn to shreds … he must have been mindlessly ripping it all this time and he didn't even realize … funny, that –

John's startled out of his reverie by the soft sound of someone clearing their throat behind him, and Jack's amused laughter. He turns around instinctively, the familiarity of the sound making something clench uncomfortably inside him, and his gaze meets a pair of beautiful blue eyes he knows oh so well. He hadn't heard her even come up behind him.

"Jeanne! What -"

"You were in your own world there," she says with a flirtatious smile. "Welcome back, we missed you."

She leans down and gives John a lingering peck on the cheek, then walks over to Jack with a big smile as he enfolds her into a friendly hug.

"I - I didn't see you there," John says. "What are - I … I didn't know you came here!"

John tenses, his mind racing, wondering if she overheard his conversation with Jack, wonders if she heard anything about his lessons - about _Rose _- and if she thinks him a fool, but she gives him a brilliant grin as she sits down on the stool next to his own. Her knee rests briefly against his, the warmth of her thigh palpable even through his trousers, and she leisurely crosses her long legs. After a moment, he relaxes.

"Lovely to see you," John adds quickly, as Jeanne smiles back at him.

"We just finished a research project," she says. "They wanted to come here to celebrate - oh! That reminds me. John, I'm sorry - I have to cancel our plan for the art exhibition. My mum's having a small procedure done that week, and she'll need me -"

She turns towards him, eyes gentle and apologetic, her hand coming to lightly rest on his arm as she speaks. He can't explain it even in his own mind, but he breathes a sigh at her words, feeling like the knot is unraveling inside him, even as he's vaguely aware that perhaps he _should_ be feeling disappointed. His first thought is of Rose, and it's a relief, really - that his thoughts have been tangled up over something that will no longer be an issue at all.

"It's fine," he says quickly, nodding. "We can see it any time, really - on a weekday after work, perhaps?"

"That would be lovely," she says.

"And … your mother? Is – is she going to be alright?"

"Oh yes! It's just cataracts. The procedure is simple enough, but her doctor says I'll need to drive her around for a week or so afterwards."

"Good … good. Glad to hear it's not serious. She's lucky to have you," he says, giving her a gentle smile.

Jeanne returns his grin, soft and slow, her hand still on his arm, giving him a small squeeze.

"I should be getting back to my group now – I'll see you later, then?"

John nods back at her, giving her a small wave as she turns to depart. As she walks away back to her table, her high heels click-clacking on the floor with every graceful stride, John's eyes only follow her for a brief moment, and then turn back to Jack, who is staring back at him, a sly grin on his face. This time, John lets himself smile in return, and Jack chuckles, elbowing John in the ribs.

"See? That's all you needed - she put you in a better mood, didn't she?"

John nods back at his friend, and the smile drifts off his face as he flags down the bartender for another ale.

"Yeah."

0-0-0-0-0-0

The next few weeks race by in somewhat of a blur, as John makes the trek from London to Weardale and back again. He feels better about things now, that he won't have to cancel plans with Rose, and he's becoming comfortable and confident in this dance between his weekdays and weekends. He feels like he's fallen into sync with this, really - weekdays in London, weekends in Weardale – his travels up north are a delightful excursion for him to look forward to.

Wilf teaches him how to make an old recipe, Westmorland pepper cake, and the whole B&B smells of spice and ginger and cloves all day long as the concoction bakes in the oven. Wilf serves it to the guests after dinner that night, alongside his usual offering of ales and ciders, and John is nearly giddy with the compliments he receives on it. Which he should consider ludicrous, really - he's spent 10 years working day and night on postdoctoral studies in physics, he should not be getting this excited over _baked goods_, but he finds that it makes his week. He especially beams when Rose has two servings and teases Wilf that John might put _him _out of a job soon if he keeps teaching him all of his best recipes.

He learns more skiing, too, of course - one weekend is spent back on the slopes of Swinhope Moor. John does marginally better this time around, not falling quite as frequently, and even learning how to somewhat successfully turn while moving downhill. It's just as much fun as last week - because he's able to stay upright more often, Rose is no longer giggling at his repeated falls. Rather, she cheers his successes, with both delighted laughter and big hugs: the first time he makes it all the way down the slope, the first time he turns properly, and even the first time he uses the ski lift without falling when he gets to the top (although _that _does earn a giggle and a tongue-touched grin). They ride the snowmobile over to Stout Point for a drink after his lesson that day, and sit at the bar with Mickey and Adam and Owen. And Jimmy, of course. The other blokes are friendly, but when his eyes meet Jimmy's, both men look away quickly, without greeting.

Another weekend was intended for more time at Swinhope Moor, as well - but John hears the rat-tat-tat of sleet and freezing rain against his window during the night. In the morning, he looks out from his window and sees the snow pitted and glossy, obviously coated with ice. His first thought is for Rose, the fear that she could fall and hurt her knee - a thought clearly shared by Wilf as well, judging by the whispered argument between them that John hears as he descends the staircase that morning for breakfast. When John tells her he's canceling his lesson for the day (although he will _clearly _pay in full regardless), and that her safety is _obviously _more important than his lesson, Rose objects - of course she does - but he tells her the lesson that he _really _wants that day is to learn how to beat her in poker, and darts, and she laughs as he grins back at her and slyly pulls out a deck of cards from his jacket.

0-0-0-0-0-0

The ice sculpting festival is _ridiculously _fun.

They play ice chess for the better part of an hour - Rose was right, of course, and the participants actually _are _the players on the life-sized chessboard, pushing around ice carvings of all the pieces in the game. He ends up as a knight, sitting proudly astride a horse-head made of ice until the moderator yells at him to get off, and Rose laughs - she's voted queen on the opposing team, and he smiles. They play until his jeans are frosty, and the bottom cuff of his pants is a frosty block of ice itself: he's still determined to catch her, but she keeps eluding him, until she finally gets a clear path to him and rams her piece into his own, knocking him off the board and out of the game. Rose laughs, declaring victory, and soon relinquishes her coveted title to someone else. Arm in arm, she scurries off with John in pursuit of hot cocoa to warm themselves up.

There's a bar there, too - they drink vodka from shot glasses made entirely of ice, the frozen tumblers frosting over from the cold mist of their mingled breaths as John clinks them together, and raises his aloft as if to make a toast.

"What do you want to drink to?" Rose laughs.

"To the best ski instructor I've ever had," he says, and she giggles.

As soon as he downs his beverage, and attempts to move his hand, he finds his tumbler has gotten stuck to his moist bottom lip. Rose laughs as he gently pries it off, her eyes riveted on his mouth even as he frees it. Pleased with his victory, he smiles, noticing that her gaze still lingers on his lips - doubtless to make sure he hadn't injured himself in the process - then gives her a wicked grin, taking her arm and leading her off see the other sights of the festival.

There's an ice sculpting competition, of course - John's not quite sure what he was expecting, but it certainly wasn't teams of two artisans wielding high-powered chainsaws, crystalline shards flung exuberantly into the air as the blocks of ice are eviscerated down into dragons, and angels, and even a miniature horse-drawn carriage. One sculptor makes a dolphin, delicate tendrils of frozen water trailing from its fins as if it had been captured in motion, mid-splash, from the ocean itself. It's breathtakingly loud and fast and intense, and although of course he'd _seen _pictures of ice sculptures on telly before back home in London, the process itself is simply beyond anything John had imagined. He glances over to Rose, eager to see _her _reaction, and instead finds her watching him, as if reveling in his enjoyment of this even more than her own. He smiles at her, her eyes sparkling in response, and she squeezes his arm in delight.

After the contest is over, she links her arm with his own and leads him over to the graffiti wall. He looks down at her and smiles, not minding this at all – they've been arm in arm most of the day, it seems, running from one event to the other, and by this point it feels quite natural. The wall itself is actually several large blocks of ice piled on top of one another as if they were bricks mortared together. The wall is flanked by buckets containing ice picks, in a variety of shapes and sizes, and Rose bends over, retrieving picks for each of them.

"What do people normally carve?" he asks, hesitant.

"Names, slogans, that sort of thing - there's not much room but you can usually find a spot," she says, eyes focused on the block in front of her.

She soon drops to her knees with her own pick and begins to chisel something out. Curious, John moves towards her. He can't make out the etchings she's making on the glistening ice, so he stands behind her, carefully watching as she carves. After a few minutes, she drops the pick back into a bucket, wipes her gloves on her trousers and stands up, admiring her handiwork. The ice itself is bumpy, and from this angle it's hard to see what she's carved in the sunlight.

"What does it say?" he asks.

She smiles, then looks away, almost embarrassed.

"Prentice Forever," she says, softly. "It's a family tradition. Dunno even how it started really, but Gramps told me about my dad carving it every time he'd come here so … that's what I do now. It's silly, I guess, just -"

"Not silly," he says. "It's lovely."

She looks away from him, smiling down at the ground. After a moment, her eyes flick back up to his, almost mischievous.

"So um ... if we're done here … do you like ice skating?" she asks.

After stopping back at the B&B to retrieve some skates, they're able to take his Volkswagon most of the way there. It's a slightly bumpy drive along a thin and winding road running through an area that looks even less inhabited than the rest of Weardale, if that's even possible. He pulls off to the side of the snowy country road when Rose motions for him to do so. Based on his past experiences and resultant deductions about the safety of the local driving conditions, he's at first a little concerned about the probability of this move landing them into a ditch, but Rose says it's okay, and he trusts her, thinking no more of it.

He gets out of the car and stretches, even though this has been only about a twenty minute ride from the B&B. They're parked on the edge of what looks like a long, wide plain, dotted with leafless trees and conifers in clusters off in the distance. There's something almost exhilarating about this place, as he looks around - it's energizing, and so unlike his day to day drudgery back home, from his flat to his office and back to his flat. It makes him want to run and skate and ski and hike, and, impatiently, he leans into the boot of the car to grab his borrowed skates.

"Oi! What do you think you're doing?" she asks teasingly.

"Getting my skates, of course," he responds, slightly confused.

"Well get your skis on first - cross country - we'll have to get there over the moor first," she says, nodding to the flat snowy plain across from where he'd parked the car. "It's about a kilometer across this way, then through a small grove of trees, then we'll be at the pond. It's gorgeous, you'll love it!"

"Skiing _and_ skating? Rose Tyler, how you spoil me," he says as she tosses her head back and laughs. It suits her, really, the gentle winter breeze blowing through her hair, and the sun reflecting of the blond strands makes her look a bit wild, a bit untamed, and underscores her natural beauty. His gaze lingers on her for a moment until he sees she's noticed and has stopped laughing. She's looking back at him a bit questioningly, and the silence is suddenly palpable in the air between them.

He fears he's being rude, and takes a deep breath. Swallowing hard, he breaks his eyes away from hers to grab his skis and skates, and they trudge off to the pond side-by-side.


	14. Chapter 14

To call this merely a _pond_ is a gross understatement.

"This is …" he trails off.

The body of water itself is frozen solid, coated in a layer of frost and windswept snow that ghosts across the surface in the slight breeze. It's surrounded on one side by the sparse grove of trees they've just passed through, and on the other side by a cliff-face of cracked shalestone, stacked some 10 metres tall, which towers imposingly over their heads. A cascade of multiple frozen waterfalls covers the surface like icy curtains suspended in time. The majestic columns of frozen water form layered icicles that hang in midair, shimmering in the sunlight like frozen diamonds encrusting the ragged edges of the shalestone cliff. It is simply _magnificent_, and he comes to a dead stop at the sight.

"Yeah," Rose says, almost breathlessly, standing at his side and staring up at the sight beside him. He glances down at her, and she up at him, giving him a slow smile. Still awestruck, he holds her gaze, watching her smile grow bigger and brighter, then grins back down at her. After a moment, she motions to a nearby rock, upon which she sits and begins to change into her skates. He turns back to the waterfall and stands there just a bit longer, breathing in the view, barely able to take his eyes from it.

"I bet it's gorgeous in the summer," he says, finally taking a seat beside her, imagining how this place comes alive when the weather warms and the sparse collection of trees surrounding the waterfall are green and full.

"It is," she smiles. "You should see it - well ... I mean … if you were ever up here again, you could - or I could send you a picture."

He doesn't know quite how to respond to that. He knows - _intellectually_, he knows, of course - that he's only booked 12 weekends here, that 6 have already flown by so much quicker than he ever could have expected, and really, what reason does he even have to return after Chamonix, when his need for lessons will be complete? He certainly has no plausible reason whatsoever to return once the snow melts, once this place that he only knows through the lens of frost and ice begins to turn warm and blossom with the promise of spring. He'd spent his whole life without ever once coming to this area before booking his lessons, and he knows the chances that he'd have a reason to come back anytime soon are slim to none. Something flips over in his stomach at the thought, something he can only characterize as uncomfortable, and he gazes mutely at the shalestone.

Rose falls silent for a moment as well, the air between them having grown heavier and a little somber. Her smile fades, her eyes dropping to her laces as she leans over and slowly begins to tie them.

"I heard fishing's good around here," he says, feeling ridiculous as soon as the words leave his mouth.

"_You_ fish?" she says, sitting up suddenly and facing him, her hands paused mid-tie on her skate's laces, a smile on her face which he's not sure looks more hopeful or more incredulous.

"Well… I _could_," he stutters, and she laughs, sounding delighted. He can't explain it even to himself, but somehow he feels relaxed, and smiles back at her broadly.

"I used to fish, with my dad, when I was young," he says. "If you know any good places around here, perhaps in the spring we can -"

He cuts himself off as her eyes fall from his again, back down towards her skates. His stomach drops again, nervous, realizing he'd presumed that she'd even _want _to. He says nothing, but inhales so deeply that the frosty air sticks uncomfortably in his lungs the way any further words seem to be sticking in his throat. They've become friends now, and so _of course_ he wants to spend time with her, but she's still his instructor and perhaps she has no interest in -

"I'd love to," she says, softly and somewhat hesitantly, interrupting his thoughts. "I just don't know if I'll still - I just … I know that gramps talked to you. About uni, I mean. I just didn't know if you still were willing to-"

"Do you want me to help you get in?" he asks, turning to face her. He exhales the breath he's been holding, and it feels almost like relief.

"I was … looking into it a bit, I guess? Most of my mates from around here go down to London to work as trainers after ski season is over here, there's a big indoor ski arena skiers use for training, about an hour outside the city … I mean, they always ask me to come but I - I've never done it before because of gramps, but he wants me to go to school and I was thinking I could earn some money that way…" her words come out in a rush, and she suddenly pauses, looking up at him once again, her gaze meeting his own.

"I mean … I wouldn't ask but you'd _offered_ before, and … only if you want to, I don't want to put you out-"

"Rose," he says, turning towards her, placing his hand gently on her shoulder. "I _want_ to help you. I meant every word I said - you're _brilliant_."

Her face breaks into a smile then, a wide grin that brings out the sparkle in her eyes, and his hand moves to her jawline for a moment, his woolen-gloved thumb grazing affectionately over the apple of her cheek. He thinks it could be his imagination, but she seems almost to lean into his palm slightly as she gazes back up at him.

"Applications are usually due in January, most schools won't have Open Days until the spring - but a good friend of mine works at one of the universities in London that recruits students without A-levels, and I'm sure he'd agree to give you a tour if I ask," John says. He gives a little shrug as his hand falls back into his lap, making a mental note to contact Jack as soon as he gets back to London on Monday.

"You might need to take come catch-up classes over the spring, but you'd be able to start in the fall if you wanted - I honestly can't see how they wouldn't take you, Rose." He gazes intently at her, meaning every word, and she beams back at him, then wraps her arms around him, pulling him in for a hug.

"Thank you," she murmurs into his shoulder, and he smiles into her hair as he puts his arms around her and embraces her in return.

They skate for the next hour, carving inelegant swirls and loops into the surface of the undisturbed pond with the blades of their skates. He hasn't been skating since he was a child, and neither one of them is particularly _good_, but that doesn't make it any less fun as they circle together on the ice, occasionally grabbing onto the other's arm for support as they try several times - unsuccessfully - to avoid falling. It strikes him that this is the first time he's seen Rose attempt an activity at which she isn't much good - a fact which, when he points it out to her, earns him an outraged swat on the arm that sends him sprawling onto the ice, and her tumbling after him as she laughs so hard that she loses her balance.

"I … wanted to ask you," she says, circling around to face him once they are both upright. "The lesson after next falls on Boxing Day, and I wasn't sure what your holiday plans are-"

"Did you want to cancel?" he says, unable to stop a small twinge of disappointment from creeping into his voice.

"No!" she says quickly, "I mean … not unless you wanted to, I just … you - you said you didn't have family, and I didn't know how you normally spend holidays…"

"No plans," he says, shrugging. Truth be told, he rarely has plans, normally spending a few hours on Christmas morning in the company of Jack and his family, something that they usually don't even get around to discussing until the day before the event.

"Would you want to come up? It's just me and gramps but … you're welcome, you know. If you don't have plans for Christmas, I mean ... you could come spend it with us …"

He smiles at her then, a soft, small grin that doesn't do justice to the slight swell he feels inside him. This is the first invitation from someone other than Jack that he's gotten in longer than he can remember. The first actual _invitation _at all, really - generally Jack just announces that John can come over if he wants to, which he does for an hour or two before heading back to his quiet flat, but this … _this _is a proper holiday, a proper invitation into a proper home and family, something he hasn't even let himself consider - or even been _able_ to consider - in years. His smile fades only slightly as he swallows down something that threatens to rise in his throat, still holding her gaze all the while.

"That would be lovely," he says, his voice almost a whisper.

"Perfect," Rose says softly, beaming back up at him, as he takes her hand and gives it a slight squeeze before heading back out onto the ice.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

The next morning, as has become their tradition, John and Wilf make breakfast together while Rose teaches a morning lesson. This time it's a full English breakfast as per the request of another guest, the father of a family of _eight _visiting from Brighton. It takes Wilf quite some time to find and drag out nearly every piece of cookware in the inn to make a breakfast that large - cast iron pots and pans and griddles that are so thick and heavy that they barely even all fit on the stovetop. John's never seen so many other guests at the inn before and can't help but wonder how long it's been since it's been so close to full capacity like this. While Wilf sets the table, John oils the pans and starts on the meats - bacon and sausage and blood sausage and ham, sizzling together on the range while the tomatoes and toast and mushrooms and eggs crackle on other oiled grills, and the baked beans and tea gently boil side by side. It smells _gorgeous_, the intermingled scents of hard work and home - and _finally_, when the other guests are all served in the dining room, John makes plates for himself and Wilf and collapses into a chair in the kitchen opposite his friend.

"I hear we're having a guest for Christmas!" Wilf says fondly, something approaching a twinkle in his eye as he pours his tea.

John pauses, fork in hand, glancing up at Wilf - this is Wilf's _home _that he's been invited into for the holiday, after all. He'd been so … well, _touched_, he supposes, when Rose asked him yesterday that it hadn't even occurred to him that Wilf might have an opinion on the matter.

"I'd… well, I'd love it. To stay. If that's okay with you, of course?"

"'Course it is! And it's _better_ than okay - we're glad to have you here, anytime, you should know that by now," he says, giving John a smile, accompanied by a pointed eyebrow raise, as if to reassure him of the truth behind the statement.

John makes a show of rolling his eyes, and grins down into his own tea.

After breakfast is over and the multitude of pans are washed and dried, Wilf finishes up John's checkout paperwork at the registration desk - insisting of course by now on a heavily discounted rate, which John ineffectively tries to talk him out of. As he stands waiting, John's gaze drops to the basket of bonnie bits. He'd noticed them on his first visit, a basket of colloquially named gemstones. He picks up a stone, a sparkling pink crystal coated with golden dust, pinching it between his thumb and forefinger and holding it up to the light of the nearby window. It glistens slightly in the hazy morning sun, the delicate colors somehow muted by the sunlight, the golden dust glinting as he turns it in his hand, examining it closer.

"So what are these, anyway?" John asks.

"Bonnie bits? Just little pieces of local crystals - fluorite, mainly. Come in all different colors. The miners used to call them that, they used to take them home to their families, like decorations. Sort of a tradition around here."

John's eyes flick to Wilf, and his face breaks into a grin as he gets an idea. He places the gemstone on the counter-top, and grabs a handful of additional crystals.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

The following two weeks go by quickly. John emails Jack as soon as he gets back to London, instinctively wanting to avoid the questions he's sure a phone call would bring, particularly since Jack seemed so curious about his ski lessons when they'd last met at the pub. Instead, he simply asks Jack if he can arrange for someone to give a special school tour for a friend. Jack replies that yes, of course any friend of John's is a friend of his as well, and they set a date several weeks in the future.

Jeanne meets John at The Natural History Museum one day after work - luckily she's available on a _weekday_, as he had suggested. The exhibit she'd wanted to see is one of the wildlife photography exhibitions the museum is famous for - photos captured by the world's greatest photographers of endangered species and botanical realms.

Side by side, they wander through the museum. When she asks about his week he prattles on about his newest research, and how even after single-handedly fixing the department's broken laser optical measurement device, he _still _had to write _both _the computer software to analyze the data _and _build the bloody computer himself - and that was just _today_, alone! He looks down at her then, and finds her looking back at him fondly, a small smile on her face. He smiles back at her – it's one of the things he's always liked so much about Jeanne after all – her genuine interest in both his work and his thoughts. Later, as they sit together in the cafe overlooking the museum's outdoor ice rink, they order coffee and discuss their favorite photographs and artists from the exhibit. As they sip their drinks, John looks down at the groups of skaters circling together on the ice below - he can't help thinking instead of ponds and waterfalls, and falling on his arse with Rose, and he inwardly smiles to himself.

That Friday, Christmas Break begins at the university. John hasn't spent much time with Luke or Clyde in weeks, as they have been busy with exams and end-of-semester coursework. John's been busy himself with exams and grading - not to mention _multiple_ excursions to the geology lab on the other side of campus. Luckily however, the boys are available briefly that afternoon to pick up additional paperwork from John for their project. Of course they arrive late, which will make _John _late, but they _do _need the paperwork, and it's Christmas, so he tries to not give them _too _stern of a glance.

"What are you doing for the holidays, Dr. Smith?" Luke asks, picking up the binder of data John has prepared and putting it in his backpack.

"I'm staying with some friends in a small town up north," John says, slightly distracted as he shoves a few textbooks into his rucksack, taking a moment to swipe a few wayward strands of hair back across his head. He looks around the room one last time before shooing his students out to lock it up for the holidays, and half-wonders if he's missing anything. It's not like he'd necessarily _need _all of the books he's packing over the break, but it will be very important that he has all possible resources he needs if Clyde and Luke have any intention of remaining on schedule with their -

"Weardale?" Clyde asks.

John snaps his head up, as something almost electric flips painfully between his brain and his stomach, and he feels his pulse quicken. He doesn't respond immediately, instead taking a breath and stares at Clyde, his stomach somersaulting over the possibilities - did he learn that by himself? Had someone told him? Moreover, had he told anyone else - had he told _Jeanne_? Even as the thought strikes him, he shrugs it off as ridiculous and highly unlikely - neither Clyde nor Luke even take French, and Clyde had only met Jeanne a few weeks prior. Unless she already somehow knows, but she would have told John, wouldn't she? He'd just seen her, after all. All of those possibilities are vaguely mortifying, and _none_ of them explains the most important issue at hand -

"How did you …"

"You've left a few receipts from there near our papers … ski lessons, right?"

John stares at Clyde for a long, silent moment, and the boy's expression slowly morphs from merely inquisitive to almost nervous during the pause. Clyde shifts his position back and forth, from one foot to the other, as if he can sense John's discomfort, and John feels a stab of guilt - this is his _own _damn fault, not Clyde's, and the boy is looking as if he's about to run for the bloody door. John takes a deep breath, puts on the closest thing to a smile that he can muster, and nods. _Dammit_.

"Ski lessons? That's so cool! Why skiing?" Luke says, crossing his arms and smiling expectantly over at John, seemingly oblivious to the tension, as if he assumed John would expound upon this.

John shifts his gaze over to Clyde, whose eyes are wider than they were a moment ago, his mouth opening and closing ineffectively several times.

"I'm sorry, Dr. Smith - I just ..."

"No, no, it's quite alright," John says, forcing another smile and turning to Luke. "Just … learning. Lifelong learning is good. Broadens the horizons. Definitely … something to do."

John motions to the door, and all three of them leave the office. John shuts the light and quickly closes the door tight behind him, locking it and shoving his keys into his pocket with such force that the teeth of one of the keys scrapes disobediently across his narrow hipbone, making him wince.

"I've got to go. Happy Christmas to both of you, I'll see you in January!"

John gives the boys a tight smile and a wave, leaving them standing side by side in the hallway as he walks briskly out to his car.


End file.
